SIX 
TREES 


MARY  E. 
WILKINS 


ALVMNVS  BOOK  FYND 


See  p.  87 


WHERE    IS    MY    WIFE?'" 


SIX    TREES 


By 

MARY  E.  W1LKINS  FREEMAN 

Author  of 

"The  Portion  of  Labor"  "Pembroke" 
"Understudies"  "Jeromt"  etc. 

ILLUSTRATED 


NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 

HARPER  6-  BROTHERS  PUBLISHERS 

1903 


Copyright,  1903,  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS. 

All  rights  reserved. 
Published  February,  1903. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

THE  ELM-TREE * 

THE  WHITE  BIRCH 4* 

THE  GREAT  PINE        •     •     •  67 

THE  BALSAM  FIR        I01 

THE  LOMBARDY  POPLAR 129 

THE  APPLE-TREE l69 


39380 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


"'WHERE  is  MY  WIFE?'".     .     .     .        Frontispiece 

"CURVING  SKYWARD  AND  EARTH 
WARD  WITH  MATCHLESS  SYM 
METRY"  Facing  p.  6 

'"WINDERS,  PIAZZERS,  CUPOLYS, 
NEW  STUN  STEPS,  AND  A  NEW 
TIN  RUFF'"  ......  "  16 

"'l'VE  GOT  SOME  NICE  GRIDDLE- 
CAKES  FOR  SUPPER  AND  A 
CUSTARD  PIE'"  .....  38 

"'SUPPOSE  YOU'VE  HEARD  I'M  GOIN' 

TO  BE  MARRIED?'"  ....  60 

"HE  SAT  A  LONG  TIME  LEANING 
AGAINST  THE  WHITE  BIRCH- 
TREE''  "  64 

"HAD  CLIMBED  DIFFERENT  HEIGHTS 

FROM  MOUNTAINS"     ....  7° 

'"GET  UP!'  HE  CRIED,  HARSHLY"  .       "  96 

v 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

'SHE  DIDN'T  EXCLAIM  EVEN  OVER 

THE  BABY'' Facing  p.  no 

'THERE  ARE  TREES  PLENTY  GOOD 

ENOUGH  OVER  THERE'"  .  .  "  I2O 
STOOD  STARING  AT  THE  GLORIFIED 

FIR-BALSAM" "  124 

THE  COUSIN  CAUGHT  HER  BREATH 

WITH  AN  AUDIBLE  GAS?"  .  *'  154 
THE  LOMBARDY  POPLAR  -  TREE 

STOOD    IN    ITS    GREEN    MAJESTY 

BEFORE  THE  HOUSE"  ...  "  164 
'NOW  YOU'VE  GONE  AN'  DONE  IT, 

EDISON  BLAKE!'" 182 

'THERE  SAT  SAM  MADDOX  ON  HIS 

DOORSTEP"  190 

lli  DON'T  SEE  WHY  WE  'AIN'T  GOT 

THANKSGIVIN'   ANY   TIME'"     .       '*          204 


THE    ELM-TREE 

:HE  elm-tree  had  his  field 
to  himself.  He  stood 
alone  in  a  wide  and  deep 
expanse  of  wind-swept 
grass  which  once  a  year 
surged  round  him  in  foaming  billows 
crested  with  the  rose  of  clover  and  the 
whiteness  of  daisies  and  the  gold  of 
buttercups.  The  rest  of  the  time  the 
field  was  green  with  an  even  slant  of 
lush  grass,  or  else  it  was  a  dun  sur 
face,  or  else  a  glittering  level  of  snow; 
but  always  there  stood  the  tree,  with 
his  green  branches  in  the  summer,  his 
gold  ones  in  the  autumn,  his  tender, 
3 


TREES 

gold-green  ones  in  the  spring,  and  his 
branches  of  naked  grace  in  the  winter, 
but  always  he  was  superb.  There  was 
not  in  the  whole  country-side  another 
tree  which  could  compare  with'him.  He 
was  matchless.  Never  a  stranger  passed 
the  elm  but  stopped  and  stared  and 
said  something  or  thought  something 
about  it.  Even  dull  rustics  looked,  and 
had  a  momentary  lapse  from  vacuity. 
I- The  tree  was  compelling.  He  insisted 
upon  a  recognition  of  his  beauty  and 
grace.  Let  one  try  to  pass  him  unheed 
ing  and  sunken  in  the  contemplation  of 
his  own  little  affairs,  and,  lo!  he  would 
force  himself  out  of  the  landscape  not 
only  upon  the  eyes,  but  the  very  soul, 
which,  turned  away  from  self,  would  see 
the  tree  through  its  windows,  like  a  rev 
elation  and  proof  of  that  which  is  out 
side  and  beyond.  It  became  at  such 
4 


THE    ELM-TREE 

times,  to  some  minds,  something  akin 
to  a  testimony  of  God.  Something  there 
was  about  the  superb  acres  of  those 
great  branches  curving  skyward  and 
earthward  with  matchless  symmetry  of 
line  which  seemed  to  furnish  an  upward 
lift  for  thought  and  imagination.  The 
field  in  which  the  tree  stood  was  a  great 
parallelogram.  On  the  left-hand  side, 
across  a  stone  wall,  was  a  house  almost 
as  old  as  the  tree.  On  the  other  side, 
across  a  new,  painted  fence,  was  a 
modern  house,  pretentious  and  ornate 
with  bracketed  cornices,  bay-windows, 
a  piazza,  and  a  cupola.  This  cupola 
especially  disturbed  the  mind  of  the 
dweller  in  the  old  house.  The  name  of 
this  dweller  was  David  Ransom.  He  was 
quite  old,  and  had  a  stiff  leg  which  neces 
sitated  a  gait  wherein  one  limb  described 
a  rigid  half-circle  before  it  was  brought 
5 


SIX    TREES 

to  the  accomplishment  of  a  forward  step. 
He  had  been  incapacitated  from  work 
for  some  years.  All  he  had  in  the  world 
was  his  poor  ancient  house  and  an  acre 
of  land  in  the  rear  on  which  he  raised 
vegetables  and  kept  a  few  hens  which 
furnished  his  humble  sustenance.  Once 
it  had  been  very  different.  He  had 
owned  the  great  field  on  which  the  elm 
stood ;  he  had  even  owned  the  new  house 
beyond,  although  in  a  simpler  form.  He 
had  built  it  very  largely  with  his  own 
hands,  for,  though  ostensibly  a  farmer, 
he  had  been  a  Jack  of  all  trades,  and 
able  to  turn  his  hand  to  almost  any 
craft  with  skill.  He  had  lived  in  the  old 
Ransom  house,  which  had  been  in  the 
family  for  four  generations,  until  he  was 
almost  an  old  man  and  his  wife  an  old 
woman ;  then  with  the  pitiful  savings  of 
a  lifetime  he  had  built  the  new  one.  He 
6 


CURVING    SKYWARD   AND    EARTHWARD   WITH   MATCHLESS 
SYMMETRY  " 


THE    ELM-TREE 

had  loved  and  handled  tenderly  every 
nail  he  had  put  into  it,  every  fragrant 
length  of  pine ;  he  had  built  it  with  the 
utmost  that  was  in  him.  Then,  just  as 
it  was  finished,  he  had  lost  it.  The  bank 
in  which  his  savings  were  stored  had 
failed,  and  there  was  nothing  to  meet 
the  payments  for  the  stock.  He  sold 
the  house  and  the  field  at  a  miserable 
sacrifice,  and  used  the  proceeds  to  pay 
the  bills,  all  except  a  proportion  which 
he  was  obliged  to  work  out.  The  old 
wife  died  shortly  afterwards ;  the  disap 
pointment  had  been  too  much  for  her. 
All  her  life  she  had  planned  and  dreamed 
about  the  new  house  which  was  to  stand 
on  the  vacant  lot.  She  had  thought 
about  it  until  in  a  sense  she  had  really 
lived  in  it,  and  an  actual  building  had 
tumbled  about  her  ears. 

After  she  died,  David  lived  alone,  and 
7 


SIX    TREES 

wound  himself  up  like  a  caterpillar  in  a 
cocoon  of  repining  and  misanthropy.  He 
seemed  bitter  to  the  core.  He  was  in 
spirit  a  revolutionist  and  anarchist.  The 
mention  of  banks  sent  him  into  a  white 
heat  of  rage.  He  nursed  his  grievances 
until  they  turned  upon  himself  and 
stung  him  to  his  own  spiritual  harm. 
One  of  his  special  bitternesses  was  the 
improvements  which  the  new  owner  had 
made  in  his  new  house.  He  resented 
them  as  he  might  have  done  any  point 
ing  out  of  his  own  personal  defects. 
When  the  new  owner,  whose  name  was 
Thomas  Savage,  set  about  building  the 
bay-window  on  the  blank  of  the  south 
wall,  David  fairly  swelled  with  indigna 
tion  and  humiliation.  That  morning  he 
went  across  the  road  and  unbottled  his 
wrath  to  old  Abner  Slocum.  Old  Abner 
lived  with  his  daughter,  who  was  a  dress- 
8 


THE    ELM-TREE 

maker — it  was  an  unskilful,  desultory 
sort  of  dress-making  at  very  low  prices — 
and  thereby  supported  in  frugal  com 
fort  herself  and  her  father,  who  was  very 
deaf.  Old  Abner,  on  pleasant  days  in 
warm  weather,  spent  most  of  his  time 
on  the  porch,  for  his  room  was  better 
than  his  company  in  the  sitting-room, 
which  was  also  the  apartment  used  for 
fitting  dresses.  David  Ransom  spent 
many  an  hour  with  him,  seated  on  the 
top  step  of  the  porch.  Abner  had  an 
old  kitchen  chair  tipped  back  against 
the  house  wall.  On  that  morning  when 
the  scaffolding  for  the  new  bay-window 
was  erected  David  went  across  the  street 
swinging  his  lame  leg  around  viciously. 
That  was  the  second  spring  after  the 
rheumatism  had  attacked  him.  It  was 
a  hot,  moist  morning  in  early  May.  The 
trees  were  beginning  to  cast  leaf-shad- 
9 


SIX    TREES 

ows,  and  the  air  was  cloyed  with  sweet. 
Old  Abner,  on  the  porch,  was  in  his 
shirt-sleeves,  his  feet  were  covered  with 
great  carpet  slippers.  He  grinned  vacu 
ously  as  David  approached.  A  curtain 
of  a  window  behind  him  went  down 
with  a  snap,  shutting  out  a  glimpse 
of  a  young  woman  upon  whom  his 
daughter  was  about  to  try  a  new 
gown. 

Abner  did  not  hear  it,  but  he  felt  it, 
and  he  smiled  slyly  at  the  new-comer. 
"Mari's  tryin'  on  a  new  gownd  to  the 
Ames  gal,"  he  chuckled. 

David  nodded  with  impatient  scorn. 
The  curtain  might  as  well  have  been 
lowered  for  a  shadow  as  for  him.  He 
settled  himself  laboriously  on  the  porch 
step  in  front  of  Abner.  His  lame  leg  was 
stretched  out  unbendingly  into  Maria 
Slocum's  bed  of  lady's-delights,  which 
10 


THE    ELM-TREE 

came  up  faithfully  in  their  old  place 
every  spring.  David  ground  his  heel 
viciously  down  among  the  flowers.  He 
scowled  at  Abner  with  almost  malignity. 
He  jerked  a  shoulder  towards  the  right. 
"  Seen  what  they  are  doin'  over  there?" 
he  inquired,  gruffly. 

Old  Abner  did  not  hear  him.  He  had 
been  gazing  forth  at  the  glories  of  the 
spring  morning,  and  he  answered  from 
the  fulness  of  his  thought. 

"  Yes,  I  guess  spring  is  'most  here,  sure 
'nough,"  he  said,  happily.  He  made  a 
curious  nestling  motion  with  his  old 
shoulders  in  a  warm  sunbeam  which  lay 
over  them  like  a  caressing  arm.  He 
smiled  contentedly.  Now  were  come 
for  him  the  long  days  of  peaceful  dozing 
on  the  porch,  undisturbed  by  his  daugh 
ter's  dress-making,  the  days  of  plenty 
of  garden  greens  and  vegetables  and 
n 


SIX    TREES 

fruit.  Keenly  sensitive  to  material 
sweets  was  old  Abner  Slocum. 

But  David  Ransom  sniffed  with  fury. 
"Spring!"  he  cried.  Then  he  shouted, 
reaching  out  a  knotted  hand  and  clutch 
ing  the  other's  lean  shank  with  a  fierce 
grip.  He  gesticulated  violently  tow 
ards  the  house  on  which  the  workmen 
were  hammering.  "See  what  they're 
doin'  of  over  there?"  he  demanded,  bit 
ing  off  every  word  and  syllable  shortly ; 
and  old  Abner  heard,  or,  if  he  did  not 
hear,  grasped  the  meaning  of  the  point 
ing  hand  and  the  smart  grip  on  his  leg. 

"  Yes,"  he  answered,  cheerfully, "  mak- 
in'  improvements,  ain't  they?" 

"Improvements!"  shrieked  David 
Ransom  — ' '  improvements  !  improve 
ments!  When  that  house  was  fit  for 
the  President  to  live  in  before.  Im 
provements!  Good  Lord!" 

13 


THK    ELM- TREE 

"That  winder  is  goin'  to  look  real 
pooty,  ain't  it?"  inquired  old  Abner, 
innocently. 

David  glared.  He  rose,  dragging  his 
lame  leg  after  him.  "Be  you  a  fool?" 
he  shouted.  Then  he  was  gone  down 
the  path  with  his  stiff  strut,  while  old 
Abner  gazed  after  him,  amiably  open- 
mouthed  like  a  baby.  Presently  he  be 
gan  to  nod,  and  finally  fell  asleep  in  the 
moist  light,  with  his  head  sunken  on  his 
breast. 

But  David  Ransom  sat  alone  on  the 
doorstep  of  his  old  house,  and  all  day 
long  his  regard  never  left  the  carpenters 
working  on  the  new  one  across  the  field. 
When  the  bay-window  and  the  new 
piazza  were  completed,  and  the  tin  roofs 
glittered  in  the  sun,  David  fell  fairly  ill. 
He  neither  ate  nor  slept.  His  eyes  look 
ed  wild  in  their  jungle  of  unkempt  beard 


SIX    TREES 

and  long,  white  hair.  He  talked  to 
himself  a  good  deal;  he  made  furious 
gestures  when  walking.  Children  turned 
to  stare  after  him ;  once  in  a  while  they 
ran  away  when  they  saw  him  coming. 
There  began  to  be  talk  of  taking  care  of 
him,  sending  him  somewhere  to  be  look 
ed  out  for,  lest  he  do  harm  to  himself 
and  others.  His  old  house  and  land 
might  pay  his  board  for  the  rest  of  his 
life,  for  he  seemed  feeble. 

David  knew  nothing  of  this.  He  con 
tinued  to  inveigh  with  a  rancor  which 
had  the  force  of  malignity  at  the  im 
provements  on  the  new  house.  When 
at  last  the  cupola  was  built,  that  was  the 
climax.  When  Maria  Slocum  saw  him 
coming  across  the  road  to  talk  it  over 
with  her  father,  she  hustled  the  old  man 
into  the  house.  "  David  Ransom  is  clean 
out  of  his  head,"  she  said,  "and  I  ain't 


THE    ELM-TREE 

goin'  to  have  him  comin'  over  here.  I'm 
afraid  of  him." 

So  when  David  reached  the  Slocum 
house  he  found  the  door  bolted  and  the 
window  -  curtain  down,  with  cautious 
gaps  for  peering  at  the  sides,  for  Maria, 
her  father,  and  a  woman  whom  she  was 
fitting,  but  David  did  not  see  them.  He 
went  stiffly  home,  talking  all  the  way 
so  loudly  that  they  could  hear  what  he 
said.  "  Bad  enough  to  hev  it  in  the 
fust  place,  then  to  go  and  build  on  to  it 
winders  and  piazzers  and  cupolys,  as  if 
it  wa'n't  good  enough  for  him.  Guess 
what  was  good  enough  for  Sarah  an'  me 
was  good  enough  for  him."  Then  he 
finished  with  a  refrain  of  misery,  "  Win 
ders,  piazzers,  cupolys,  new  stun  steps, 
and  a  new  tin  ruff."  He  said  the 
last  in  a  sort  of  singsong  over  and 
over.  That  was  the  burden  of  his 


SIX    TREES 

thoughts,  the  summing  up  of  his  griev 
ances. 

"Something  had  ought  to  be  done 
about  David  Ransom,"  said  Maria  Slo- 
cum  to  the  woman  who  was  being  fitted, 
and  the  woman  agreed  with  her. 

That  night  a  strange  thing  happened : 
one  of  the  catastrophes  which  serve  to 
punctuate  and  paragraph  the  monotony 
of  village  life.  The  new  house  which 
had  been  built  by  David  Ransom  and 
purchased  and  improved  by  Thomas 
Savage  wasr  burned  to  the  ground.  At 
midnight  the  sky  was "  rosy  for  miles 
around,  and  the  air  resonant  with  bells ; 
at  dawn  there  was  only  a  bed  of  glowing 
coals  and  ashes.  Everybody,  of  course, 
suspected  David,  although  there  was  no 
proof  except  his  well-known  bitterness 
regarding  the  improvements.  He  was 
under  a  ban,  though  he  was  not  arrested. 
16 


WINDERS,  PIAZZERS,   CUPOLYS,   NEW    STUN    STEPS,  AND 
A    NEW    TIN    RUFF'" 


SIX    TREES 

bodice.     "Ain't    there    a    little    pouch 
where  the  sleeve  goes  in?" 

"  That  '11  be  all  right  when  it's  stitch 
ed.  They  don't  think  it's  safe  for  him 
to  be  'round,  and  they  don't  think  he  has 
proper  victuals.  For  my  part,  I  ain't 
afraid  of  him  as  I  used  to  be  before  the 
house  was  burned.  He  don't  talk  to  him 
self ,  nor  make  motions  the  way  he  used 
to.  He  just  sits  real  kind  of  still  on  his 
doorstep.  He  come  over  here  to  see 
father  the  other  day,  and  he  seemed  real 
mild  and  gentle.  I  ain't  a  mite  afraid 
of  him,  nor  I  ain't  afraid  he'll  set  me 
afire,  and  I  never  believed  he  set  Thomas 
Savage  afire.  Mis'  Savage  was  always 
dreadful  careless  about  fire — used  to 
carry  live  coals  in  a  shovel  all  over  the 
house  when  she  wanted  to  kindle  fires  in 
the  air-tight  stoves,  and  the  Savage  boy 
made  a  bonfire  in  the  barn  once.  They 
18 


THE    ELM-TREE 

don't  tell  of  it,  on  account  of  the  in 
surance,  but  I  heard  it  real  straight ;  and 
they  ain't  goin'  to  build  there  again; 
goin'  out  of  town;  guess  there's  reason 
enough.  I  ain't  goin'  to  believe  that 
David  Ransom  did  such  a  thing  as  that, 
if  he  did  used  to  talk  so.  He's  had 
an  awful  hard  time,  and  it  wa'n't  his 
fault." 

"S'pose  he'll  take  it  hard  goin'  to 
'Leazer's,"  said  the  woman. 

"I'm  dreadful  afraid  he  will,  and  I 
don't  blame  him.  I  know  'Leazer  Wise, 
and  his  wife,  too.  I  know  how  I'd  feel 
if  it  was  father  goin'." 

"  Your  father  '11  feel  bad  to  have  him 

go." 

"Yes;  I  'ain't  dared  say  anything 
about  it  to  father." 

A  little  later  Maria,  glancing  out  of 
the  window,  after  taking  in  an  under- 
19 


SIX    TREES 

arm  seam,  exclaimed,  "Why,  where's 
father?" 

"Ain't  he  there?"  asked  the  woman, 
screwing  her  head  around. 

"No,  and  he  was  sittin'  there  just  a 
minute  ago,  sound  asleep.  Well,  mebbe 
the  flies  plagued  him,  and  he's  gone 
down  in  the  orchard  under  the  trees; 
sometimes  he  does." 

Old  Abner  Slocum  had  just  toddled 
out  of  sight  around  the  Ransom  house 
opposite,  to  the  garden  where  David 
was  picking  some  corn  for  his  supper. 
A  little  later  he  returned,  and  his 
daughter  saw  him.  She  came  to  the 
door,  the  woman's  dress -waist  in  her 
hand.  "  Where  have  you  been,  fa 
ther?"  she  cried,  drawing  her  thread 
through. 

Old  Abner  did  not  hear,  but  he  knew 
what  she  said.  "Over  to  David's,"  he 
20 


THE    ELM-TREE 

replied,  quaveringly.  His  eyes  looked 
watery  and  his  mouth  unusually  firm. 

Maria  regarded  him  sharply.  Then 
she  reflected  that  he  must  have  been 
asleep,  and  not  able  to  hear,  in  any  case, 
what  she  and  the  woman  had  been 
talking  about. 

"Well,  you'd  better  sit  down  and 
keep  cool,  father,"  said  she;  "you  look 
all  het  up." 

Then  she  re-entered  the  house,  and 
old  Abner  settled  himself  in  his  chair 
on  the  porch.  Presently  one  of  the 
selectmen  of  the  village,  who  lived  a 
little  farther  down  the  road,  and  who 
was  to  take  David  to  Eleazer  Wise's 
next  morning,  rode  by  in  a  light  ex 
press-wagon  in  a  cloud  of  dust.  ' '  Hullo, 
Abner!  Hot  day!"  he  shouted,  ur 
banely.  Abner  waited  until  he  had  pass 
ed,  then  he  slowly  shook  his  fist  at  him. 

21 


SIX    TREES 

The  next  morning  Maria  Slocum  kept 
down  the  curtain  of  her  front  window 
facing  the  Ransom  house.  "  I  dun'no' 
as  you  can  see  in  here,"  she  said  to  her 
first  customer,  "but  they  are  goin'  to 
take  David  Ransom  to  board  to  'Leazer 
Wise's  this  morning;  they  think  he 
ought  to  be  looked  after,  and  I  don't 
want  to  see  it.  He's  lived  there  ever 
since  I  was  born,  and  father  sets  a  heap 
by  him,  and  he's  had  a  hard  time,  poor 
man.  I  don't  see  why  they  can't  let 
him  alone.  He  never  set  that  fire  any 
more  than  I  did,  and  he  wouldn't  hurt 
a  baby  kitten ;  never  would,  for  all 
he  used  to  talk  so.  If  he  ain't  quite 
so  comfortable  where  he  is,  he's 
enough  sight  happier  than  he'll  be  to 
'Leazer's." 

"I've  heard  'Leazer  Wise  wa'n't  any 
too  mild,"  said  the  other  woman. 

22 


THE    ELM-TREE 

"  I  wouldn't  want  father  to  go  there," 
said  Maria. 

There  was  a  sound  of  wheels  outside. 
"Guess  'Leazer  and  John  Dagget  have 
come  for  him  now,"  said  Maria. 

The  woman  peeped  round  the  cur 
tain.  "Yes,  they  hev,"  said  she;  ".it's 
John's  wagon." 

"  They're  goin'  to  try  to  let  the  house, 
and  have  the  rent  pay  his  board,"  said 
Maria.  "See  anything  of  him?" 

"  No.  They're  just  goin'  in  the  front 
gate.  Now  they're  knockin'." 

"Anybody  come  to  the  door?" 

"No.     They're  knocking  again." 

"Anybody  come?" 

"No.     Now  they're  try  in'  the  door." 

"Are  they  goin'  in?" 

"Yes,  they're  goin'  in." 

There  was  a  silence.    Presently  Maria 
spoke.    ' '  See  anything  of  him  ? ' ' 
23 


SIX    TREES 

"No;  can't  see  a  sign  of  anybody." 

"  Ain't  it  dreadful  queer? " 

"Seems  to  me  it  is.  You  don't 
s'pose  anything  has  happened,  do  you?" 

"I  dun'no'.     It's  dreadful  queer." 

The  woman  made  an  exclamation. 

"What  is  it?"  asked  Maria,  anxious 
ly.  "What  do  you  see,  Mis'  Abbot?" 

"Why,  they're  comin'  out,"  replied 
the  woman. 

"He  with 'em?" 

"No,  he  ain't.     My  land!" 

"What  is  it?" 

"They're  comin'  over  here." 

Indeed,  as  she  spoke  Eleazer  Wise 
and  the  selectman  crossed  the  road 
to  the  Slocum  house,  and  Maria  ran 
trembling  to  the  door. 

The  woman  who  was  being  fitted 
stood  back  out  of  sight,  since  she  had 
not  her  dress  on,  and  listened  at  the 
24 


THE    ELM-TREE 

door.  She  heard  Maria  reply  to  a  ques 
tion  in  her  high,  agitated  voice.  "No, 
David  Ransom  ain't  here.  I  'ain't  set 
eyes  on  him  to-day.  You  can't  find 
him?  You  don't  say  so !  What  do  you 
s'pose  has  happened  to  him?" 

Old  Abner  Slocum  sat  on  the  porch, 
with  his  handkerchief  over  his  eyes. 
He  had  not  stirred.  Maria  shook  him 
violently  by  the  shoulder,  as  Eleazer 
Wise  inquired  of  him  if  he  had  seen 
David  Ransom  that  day,  and  his  voice 
was  strained  to  razor  -  like  sharpness, 
though  it  was  naturally  soft.  But  old 
Abner  did  not  hear.  He  gave  a  sleepy 
grunt  like  a  disturbed  animal,  shrugged 
his  shoulder  loose  from  his  daughter's 
grasp,  flirted  the  handkerchief  pettishly 
over  his  face,  settled  his  head  back,  and 
gave  vent  to  an  ostentatious  snore. 

Eleazer  Wise,  who  was  a  thin-nosed, 
25 


SIX    TREES 

pensive-looking  man,  and  the  selectman, 
who  was  exceedingly  tall  and  bore  him 
self  with  a  dull  dignity,  went  their  ways 
in  the  latter 's  light  wagon,  presuma 
bly  to  search  for  David  Ransom.  The 
horse  was  whipped  to  a  smart  trot. 
Maria  called  after  them  to  know  what 
they  were  going  to  do,  but  she  got 
no  response.  She  looked  hard  at  her 
father,  who  sat  quite  still,  making  a 
loud,  purring  sound.  Then  she  went 
into  the  house.  The  minute  she  was 
gone  old  Abner  slipped  the  handker 
chief  from  his  face,  and  stared  with  a 
wonderful  keenness  of  bright  old  eyes 
across  the  road  at  the  beautiful  elm- 
tree  in  the  midst  of  the  field  in  a  rosy 
and  green  foam  of  grass  and  clover. 
He  waved  the  handkerchief  which  he 
had  taken  from  his  face.  There  was 
a  tiny  answering  gleam  of  white  from 
26 


THE    ELM-TREE 

the  massy  greenness  of  the  elm.  Old 
Abner  chuckled  softly.  Then  he  mut 
tered  to  himself,  "  Can't  do  nothin' 
afore  dark,"  and  settled  for  a  nap  in 
good  faith. 

It  was  a  very  warm  night,  and  dark 
except  for  the  stars.  The  twilight 
lingered  long,  but  at  last  the  village  lay 
in  deep  shadow,  and  one  could  not  dis 
tinguish  objects  far  in  advance.  Once 
that  night  Maria  Slocum  thought  she 
heard  a  noise  on  the  porch,  and  got  out 
of  bed  and  thrust  her  head  out  of  the 
open  window.  ''Anybody  there?"  she 
called,  softly  and  timorously.  There 
was  a  dead  silence.  She  peered  into 
the  darkness,  but  could  see  nothing. 
She  went  back  to  bed,  and  thought  she 
must  have  been  mistaken.  Once  after 
that  she  was  wakened  from  sleep  by  a 
strange  sound,  and  this  time  she  light- 
27 


SIX    TREES 

ed  a  candle  and  crossed  the  little  entry 
to  her  father's  room.  She  opened  the 
door  softly,  and  a  glance  showed  her 
the  gleam  of  the  white  head  on  the  pil 
low. 

"Must  have  been  rats,"  she  thought, 
and  returned  to  her  own  chamber;  and 
slept  undisturbed  the  rest  of  the  night. 

The  next  morning  she  went  into  the 
pantry  to  cut  some  slices  from  a  piece 
of  corned  beef,  and  stared  incredulous 
ly.  She  looked  everywhere,  standing 
on  tiptoe  to  search  the  upper  shelves. 
Then  she  hurried  into  the  kitchen, 
where  her  father  sat  waiting  for  his 
breakfast.  He  cast  a  scared  glance  at 
her  as  she  entered;  then  he  turned  his 
chair  around  with  a  grating  noise  and 
stared  intently  out  of  the  window. 
"Well,  you've  got  to  go  without  your 
breakfast,"  said  Maria. 
28 


THE    ELM-TREE 

Old  Abner  made  no  sign. 

Maria  raised  her  voice  higher.  "  Can't 
you  hear,  father?"  she  cried.  "  You'll 
have  to  go  without  your  breakfast. 
There  ain't  a  thing  in  the  house  to  eat 
but  some  bread-and-butter." 

The  old  man  rolled  one  bright  eye  at 
her  over  his  shoulder,  then  he  stared 
out  of  the  window  again.  A  red  flush 
was  evident  mounting  his  neck  to  his 
thin  fringe  of  white  hair. 

"All  that  corn'  beef  is  gone,  every 
mite  of  it,"  proclaimed  Maria,  in  a  voice 
of  tragedy.  "  I  heard  a  noise  last  night. 
I  knew  I  did.  There  was  a  thief  in  this 
house  last  night,  father." 

Old  Abner  appeared  to  hear.  His 
shoulders  heaved,  but  he  did  not  look 
around. 

"  A  thief  came  into  this  house  through 
the  pantry  window,  and  stole  all  that 
29 


SIX    TREES 

corn'  beef,"  repeated  Maria.  "It's 
gone,  and  it  couldn't  go  without  hands. 
Some  tramp,  I  s'pose,  that  was  hungry. 
I  paid  'most  fifty  cents  for  that  corn' 
beef,  but  I  s'pose  I  ought  to  be  thank 
ful.  He  might  have  stole  Miss  Bemis's 
black  silk  dress.  You'll  have  to  put  up 
with  toasted  bread  for  your  breakfast, 
father.  Do  you  hear,  father?  You'll 
have  to  put  up  with  toasted  bread  and 
coffee  for  your  breakfast." 

"All  right,"  mumbled  the  old  man. 

Maria  went  out  of  the  room,  and  the 
sound  of  the  coffee-mill  in  the  shed  re 
sounded  through  the  house.  Then  old 
Abner  turned  around  and  noiselessly 
doubled  himself  up  with  merriment. 

The  day  was  very  pleasant  and  clear, 

although  still  warm.     Maria  toiled  at 

her  dress  -  making,  and  old  Abner  sat 

peacefully  on  the  porch.     The  selectman 

30 


THE    ELM-TREE 

and  Eleazer  visited  the  house  once,  and 
inquired  if  they  had  seen  anything  of 
David;  they  also  searched  again  in  the 
old  Ransom  house.  In  the  afternoon, 
just  after  the  two  men  had  driven  away, 
and  Maria  had  the  front  curtains  drawn 
to  keep  out  the  sun,  old  Abner  stole 
around  the  house,  got  a  tin  pail  from  the 
pantry,  drew  it  full  of  cold  water  at  the 
well,  and  slunk  swiftly,  padding  like  an 
old  dog  in  his  carpet  -  slippered  feet, 
across  the  opposite  field  to  the  elm- tree. 
He  stood  underneath,  casting  wary 
glances  around ;  he  held  the  pail,  catch 
ing  a  gleam  of  the  western  sun  from  its 
polished  sides  until  it  looked  as  if  on  fire. 
He  fumbled  away  at  its  handle,  then 
suddenly,  as  if  by  some  unseen  agency, 
it  was  drawn  up  and  out  of  sight  into 
the  green  umbrage  of  the  great  tree. 
Old  Abner  turned  about  gleefully  after 
31 


SIX    TREES 

a  furtive  hiss  of  whisper  sent  after  the 
ascending  pail,  and  his  daughter  Maria 
stood  unexpectedly  behind  him.  Sly 
ness  and  sharpness  were  family  traits. 
She  had  been  suspicious  ever  since  she 
had  missed  the  meat  in  the  morning. 
Old  Abner  turned  quite  pale.  He 
chuckled  feebly  to  hide  his  consterna 
tion,  and  he  stared  helplessly  at  Maria. 

"What  in  creation  are  you  doing 
here,  father?"  she  asked,  sternly.  She 
spoke  quite  low,  but  he  heard  her  per 
fectly. 

"I  ain't  doin'  anything,  Mari,"  he  re 
plied,  feebly,  shifting  in  his  carpet  slip 
pers. 

"You  needn't  talk  that  way  to  me, 
father;  I  know  better.  You're  up  to 
something.  What  were  you  doing  with 
that  pail,  and  how  came  it  to  go  up  in 
the  tree?" 

32 


THE    ELM-TREE 

Maria  peered  upward,  and  stood  trans 
fixed.  Out  of  the  great  spread  of  the 
tree,  that  majesty  of  green  radiances 
and  violet  shadows  and  high-lights  as 
of  emeralds — out  of  this  fairy  mottle,  as 
of  jewels  and  shadows  and  sunbeams, 
stared  the  face  of  old  David  Ransom, 
and  the  face  was  inexpressibly  changed. 
All  the  bitterness  and  rancor  were  gone. 

It  was  the  face  of  a  man  in  shelter 
from  the  woes  and  stress  of  life.  He 
looked  forth  from  the  beautiful  arms  of 
the  great  tree  as  a  child  from  the  arms 
of  its  motherl  He  had  fled  for  shelter 
to  a  heart  of  nature,  and  it  had  not 
failed  him.  He  smiled  down  at  Maria 
with  a  peaceful  triumph. 

''They  never  thought  of  lookin'  for 
me  here,"  he  called  down.  "I  wa'n't 
goin'  to  'Leazer's." 

"David  Ransom,  you  'ain't  been  up 
33 


SIX    TREES 

there  all  this  time,  in  that  tree!" 
gasped  Maria.  "  Why,  they've  got  men 
huntin'  in  the  woods,  and  they're  goin' 
to  drag  the  pond." 

David  laughed  in  a  silver  strain  as 
sweetly  as  a  child. 

''Never  thought  of  lookin'  for  me 
here,"  said  he.  "I  wa'n't  goin'  to 
'Leaser's." 

"How  on  earth  did  you  ever  get  up 
there  with  your  lame  leg?" 

"I  clim." 

"How?  You  wa'n't  up  there  all 
night?" 

David  nodded,  setting  the  green 
leaves  nodding.  He  was  comfortably 
astride  a  large  bough,  with  another  be 
low  it,  affording  him  a  rest  for  his  feet. 
His  back  and  head  were  against  the 
trunk  of  the  tree.  He  rested  as  com 
fortably  as  if  in  an  arm-chair  midway 
34 


THE    ELM-TREE 

of  the  tree,  entirely  concealed  from 
view  except  to  one  standing  directly 
beneath  him. 

"  It  beats  all,"  said  Maria.  "  I  s'pose 
you  carried  him  that  corn'  beef,  fa 
ther?  That  was  where  it  went  to." 

"I  wa'n't  goin'  to  let  an  old  neigh 
bor  starve,  Man,"  said  old  Abner,  with 
boldness. 

Maria  stood  staring  at  him. 

"I  carried  him  some  bread,  too,  an'  a 
piece  of  squash  pie,"  said  old  Abner, 
defiantly,  in  his  cracked  treble  of  age. 

Maria  looked  up  at  old  David  in  the 
tree.  "Mr.  Ransom,  you  come  down 
here  as  quick  as  you  can,"  said  she, 
authoritatively. 

David  made  an  attempt  to  climb 
higher.  His  bough  rocked. 

"Come  right  down  here,"  repeated 
Maria.  "You  'ain't  got  to  go  to 

«  35 


SIX    TREES 

'Leazer's.     I  ain't  afraid  of  you.     You 
didn't  set  that  house  afire,  did  you?" 

"  No,  I  didn't,"  called  down  David. 

1  'Well,  you  come  down  here.  You 
sha'n't  go  to  'Leazer's.  You  can  board 
with  me.  I  need  the  money  as  much 
as  'Leazer  Wise.  You  can  have  the 
south  chamber,  or  you  can  sleep  in  your 
own  house,  if  you  want  to,  till  it's 
rented,  if  you'd  feel  more  to  home." 

"I've  moved  out  of  my  old  house," 
called  David. 

"All  right,  you  can  have  the  south 
chamber  in  my  house,  and  you  and 
father  can  have  real  good  times  to 
gether.  Come  down.  Can  you  git 
down?" 

David  began  swinging  himself  down 
ward  with  painful  slowness. 

"Be    careful    you    don't    fall    and 
break  your  bones." 
36 


THE    ELM-TREE 

David  descended.  When  he  was  just 
ready  to  slide  down  the  shaggy  trunk 
below  the  spread  of  large  branches,  he 
paused  and  looked  down  at  Maria  with 
lingering  doubt  and  distrust. 

"You  needn't  be  afraid,"  said  Maria. 
The  tears  were  running  down  her 
cheeks.  "You  sha'n't  go  anywheres 
you  don't  want  to.  I'll  look  out  for 
you,  and  I'd  like  to  see  anybody  stop 
me."  There  was  decision  in  Ma 
ria's  voice  which  compelled  confidence. 
Still,  David  looked  down  hesitatingly, 
like  a  child  afraid  to  leave  its  mother. 

"Come  right  along,"  said  Maria, 
"and  look  out  you  don't  fall  and 
break  your  bones.  I've  got  some  nice 
griddle-cakes  for  supper  and  a  custard 
pie." 

David  slid  down. 

After  that  the  two  old  men  could 
37 


SIX    TREES 

have  been  seen  all  day  seated  on  the 
porch  of  the  Slocum  house  wrapped  in 
the  silence  of  peaceful  memories.  A 
family  moved  into  the  old  Ransom 
house,  and  they  enjoyed  watching  the 
children  play  about.  David  took  a 
fancy  to  one  little  girl.  Sometimes  he 
coaxed  her  over,  and  he  told  her  one 
story  of  his  own  childhood  which  his 
father  had  told  him.  It  was  uncouth 
and  pointless,  but  the  child  loved  it, 
and  the  two  men  hailed  its  climax  al 
ways  with  innocent  laughter.  The  three 
were  children  together.  Old  David  was 
never  bitter  nor  rebellious  in  those  days, 
but  his  mind  was  somewhat  affected 
after  a  curious  and,  as  some  would 
have  it,  merciful  fashion.  Maria  said 
openly  that  it  was  a  blessing  that 
he  looked  at  things  the  way  he  did, 
that  she  believed  that  the  Lord  was 

38 


I'VE     GOT     SOME     NICE     GRIDDLE  -  CAKES     FOR     SUPPER 
AND    A    CUSTARD    PIE  '" 


THE    ELM-TREE 

sort  of  tellin'  him  stories  to  keep  him 
goin'  in  his  hard  road  of  life,  the  way 
folks  tell  stories  to  children.  She  dis 
covered  it  before  old  David  had  been 
domiciled  with  her  twenty-four  hours. 

It  was  the  next  morning  after  he 
came  there.  He  and  her  father  were 
talking  together  on  the  porch,  and  she 
heard  David  saying  this  to  old  Abner: 
"You  see  that  house  over  there,"  said 
he ;  "  ain't  it  handsome?  It's  the  hand 
somest  house  in  this  town,  and  it's  all 
mine.  Nobody  else  has  the  right  to 
set  foot  in  it.  I  had  it  painted  green, 
and  it's  higher  than  the  meetin' -house. 
Can't  nobody  find  any  fault  with  that 
house.  Nobody  is  going  to  build  cupolys 
nor  bay-winders  on  that,  I  can  tell  ye. 
It's  jest  right." 

Maria  and  the  woman  whom  s1ie  was 
fitting  stared  at  each  other. 
39 


SIX    TREES 

"Did  you  hear  that?"  asked  Maria, 
pale  and  trembling. 

"He's  out  of  his  head,"  said  the 
woman. 

Maria  leaned  out  of  the  window. 
"Where  is  your  house,  Mr.  Ransom?" 
she  asked,  in  a  gentle  voice. 

Old  David  pointed. 

"He  means  the  elm -tree,"  said 
Maria. 


WHITE  BIRCH 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 


one  time  the  birch-tree 
had  sisters,  and  they 
stood  close  together  in 
sun  and  wind  and  rain, 
in  winter  and  summer. 
Their  pretty,  graceful  limbs  were  in 
tertwined;  their  rustling  leaves  were 
so  intermingled  that  one  could  not  tell 
to  which  they  belonged ;  the  same  rain 
fell  on  all  alike;  the  same  snows  bent 
them  to  the  ground  in  long  garlands  of 
grace;  the  same  misty  winds  lashed 
them  about;  the  same  sunlight  awoke 
their  green  leaves  like  green  butterflies 
in  the  spring.  But  all  her  sisters  were 
43 


SIX    TREES 

gone;  one  or  two  had  died  of  them 
selves,  the  others  had  been  lopped 
down  by  the  woodsman,  and  there  was 
only  the  one  white  birch  left.  She 
stood  with  the  same  inclination  of  her 
graceful  trunk  and  limbs  which  she 
had  had  on  account  of  her  sisters,  and 
which  she  never  would  have  had  ex 
cept  for  them.  She  was  a  tree  alone, 
but  with  the  habit  of  one  growing  in 
the  midst  of  a  family.  All  her  lines 
and  motions  were  leanings  towards  an 
old  love.  The  white  birch  felt  always, 
as  a  man  will  feel  a  missing  limb,  the 
old  spread  of  the  others'  branches,  the 
wind  and  the  rain  and  the  sun  in  them. 
She  never  fairly  knew  that  she  was 
alone,  that  her  sisters  were  not  there. 
When  the  snows  of  winter  fell,  she  felt 
them,  soft  and  cool  and  sheltering, 
weighing  down  her  sisters'  limbs  as  well 
44 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

as  her  own ;  when  the  spring  rain  came, 
there  was  not  a  young  leaf  of  the  trees 
which  were  gone  but  was  evident  to 
her  consciousness;  and  when  the  birds 
returned  and  sang  and  nested,  she  was 
never  sure  that  they  were  not  in  her 
sisters'  green-draped  arms  instead  of 
her  own.  But  there  were  times  when 
she  had  a  bewildered  feeling  that  some 
thing  was  wrong,  that  something  was 
gone.  She  lived  in  a  grove  where  there 
were  many  other  birch-trees,  most  of 
them  growing  in  clumps;  and  some 
times,  looking  at  them,  she  had  a  sense 
of  loss. 

Not  very  far  from  the  tree  was  Joseph 
Lynn's  house,  the  old  Lynn  homestead 
where  he  had  been  born  and  had  lived 
for  fifty  years.  The  house,  from  some 
idiosyncrasy  of  his  ancestors,  had  been 
set  back  from  the  highway  in  the  fields, 

45 


SIX    TREES 

close  to  the  birch  grove.  The  descend 
ants  had  often  wondered  and  rebelled  at 
the  will  of  the  dead  man  who  had  built 
the  house.  They  wondered  if  he  had 
wished  to  turn  the  highway  from  its 
course,  if  he  had  had  some  old  feud  with 
a  neighbor.  There  had  been  talk  of 
moving  the  house,  though  it  would  have 
been  a  severe  undertaking  to  move  the 
square  old  structure,  built  of  massive 
timbers  around  an  enormous  central 
chimney.  But  Joseph,  who  was  the 
last  of  his  race,  never  had  contemplat 
ed  the  moving  until  recently.  Perhaps 
there  was  in  him  something  of  the 
spirit  of  the  ancestor  who  had  set  the 
homestead  in  its  isolated  place.  He 
loved  to  be  away  from  the  windows 
of  neighbors,  and  the  rattle  of  wheels 
along  the  dusty  road;  he  loved  the  si 
lent  companionship  of  trees  and  fields, 
46 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

and  had  no  wish  for  anything  else  un 
til  he  fell  in  love  with  Sarah  Ben  ton. 
He  would  call  her  Sarah,  even  to  his 
own  thoughts,  although  she  was  Sadie 
to  everybody  else.  There  was  in  him, 
in  spite  of  apparent  pliability  and  gen 
tleness,  a  vein  of  obstinacy,  and  he 
loved  the  old  above  the  new.  His 
own  mother's  name  had  been  Sarah; 
he  rejected  the  modern  paraphrase  of 
it.  The  girl  herself  was  cheaply  and 
inanely  pretty ;  by  some  method  known 
to  love,  and  love  alone,  he  was  blind 
to  that  element  of  commonness  and  un- 
worthiness,  and  saw  only  in  her  the 
woman  of  his  dreams.  He  refined  her 
to  such  an  extent  with  the  fires  of  his 
love  that,  had  she  seen  herself  as  she 
existed  in  his  mind,  she  would  never 
have  known  herself.  She  had  spent 
many  hours  before  her  looking-glass  in 
47 


SIX    TREES 

her  short  life,  but  she  had  never  pos 
sessed  a  looking-glass  like  that. 

People  in  the  village  said  that  Joseph 
Lynn  was  a  fool  to  marry  such  a  pretty, 
silly  young  thing  at  his  age,  and  in  the 
same  breath  said  that  she  was  a  girl 
who  knew  how  to  feather  her  nest,  and 
yet  condemned  her  for  being  willing  to 
give  herself  to  a  man  old  enough  to  be 
her  father.  Nobody  dreamed  that  she 
loved  him.  The  girl  was  poor.  She  went 
about  dress-making  from  house  to  house 
to  support  herself ;  and  Joseph  had  his 
comfortable  home,  and  income  enough 
.to  almost  keep  her  in  luxury,  or  what 
meant  luxury  to  a  girl  of  her  standing 
in  life.  People  looked  at  her  with  a 
mixture  of  approval  of  her  shrewdness 
and  contempt.  One  young  girl  mate 
of  hers  attacked  her  openly.  She 
boarded  with  this  girl's  mother,  and  one 
48 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

night  after  Joseph  Lynn  had  been  court 
ing,  she  spoke  out.  She  went  into  the 
parlor  and  stood  before  Sarah,  fairly 
trembling  with  indignation  and  maiden 
ly  shame.  The  girl  was  very  plain,  with 
a  face  so  severe  in  its  maidenliness  that 
it  seemed  like  a  sharp  wedge  of  accu 
sation.  She  had  never  had  a  lover  in 
all  her  life ;  she  never  would  have.  She 
had  never  even  dreamed  of  love.  She 
lived  her  life  and  did  her  duty  without 
passion  ;  that  which  had  brought  her  j 
into  being  seemed  not  to  exist  in  her./ 
Her  drab  -  colored  hair  was  combed 
straight  back  from  her  uncompro 
mising  outlook  of  face;  her  skin  was 
dull,  and  the  blushes  struggled  through 
it.  She  held  her  two  hands  clinch 
ed  at  her  sides ;  her  figure,  wide 
and  flat-bosomed,  looked  as  rigid  as 
iron. 


SIX    TREES 

"I  want  to  know,"  said  she,  "if  you 
are  really  going  to  marry  him." 

"Yes,  I  am,"  replied  the  other  girl. 
Her  pretty  face  blazed,  she  shrugged 
her  shoulders,  and  looked  down  at  the 
ruffle  of  her  gown. 

"Going  to  marry  that  man?"  re 
peated  the  other  girl. 

"I'd  like  to  know  why  I  shouldn't. 
What  is  there  the  matter  with  him?" 
asked  Sarah,  defiantly. 

"Marrying  a  man  old  enough  to  be 
your  father  for  a  home,"  said  the  girl. 

"  Lots  of  girls  do. " 

"I  don't  see  why  that  makes  it  any 
better  for  you.  You  can't  care  any 
thing  about  him." 

"I'd  like  to  know  what's  the  matter 
with  him.  He's  a  good,  kind  man." 

"  And  he's  got  money,"  said  the  other 
girl,  in  a  tone  of  ineffable  contempt  and 
50 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

shame,  as  if  she  were  ashamed  of  her 
self  as  well  as  her  friend.  As  she  spoke 
she  looked  as  if  she  saw  Joseph  Lynn 
standing  before  her,  and  Sarah  Benton 
looked  at  the  same  place,  as  if  she  also 
saw  him.  Indeed,  both  girls  saw  him 
with  their  minds'  eyes,  standing  before 
them  as  visibly  as  if  he  had  been  there 
in  the  flesh.  They  saw  a  very  tall, 
stiffly  carriaged  man,  with  a  dispro 
portionately  long  neck,  and  a  cloud 
of  curly  blond  beard  like  moss,  which 
reached  well  over  his  breast.  He  was 
not  a  man  to  appeal  to  the  fancy  of  any 
young  girl,  but  rather  to  repel  her,  and 
awaken  her  ridicule  through  a  certain 
unnamable  something  which  seemed  to 
mark  him  as  unmated  with  youth  and 
youthful  fancies. 

"You  ain't  going  to  marry  him?" 
said  again  the  other  girl,  whose  name 
5T 


SIX    TREES 

was  Maria.  All  the  shame  of  maidenly 
imagination  was  in  her  voice  and  her 
look,  and  Sarah  quailed  before  it. 

"I'd  like  to  know  why  not?"  she  de 
manded,  but  her  voice  faltered. 

' '  Marry  him  ?' '  repeated  the  girl.  The 
two  words  meant  everything.  Sarah 
blushed  hotly. 

"He's  a  good,  kind  man,"  she  half 
whimpered  out — "a  good,  kind  man, 
and  I'm  alone  in  the  world,  and  he'll 
take  care  of  me ;  and  I've  always  worked 
hard,  and—  Sarah  began  to  sob  con 
vulsively. 

"  How  about  Harry  Wyman?" 

Sarah  Benton  only  sobbed  more  un 
restrainedly. 

"Harry  Wyman  has  only  got  his 
day's  wages,  and  he  lost  his  job,  any 
how,  last  month;  but  you  couldn't 
wait,"  said  Maria.  "And  you  know 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

you  like  him  best,  and  you  know  how 
he  feels  about  you,  and  now  you'll  mar 
ry  this  other  man;  you'll  sell  your 
self." 

"Stop  talking  to  me  so!"  cried  Sa 
rah,  with  a  flash  of  resentment. 

"  I  won't ;  it's  the  truth, "  said  Maria, 
mercilessly.  "You  do  mean  to  sell 
yourself."  She  drew  herself  up  and 
looked  at  Sarah  with  an  unspeakable 
scorn  and  contempt.  "You  mean  to 
marry  him,"  she  repeated,  and  again 
there  was  all  the  meaning  which  the 
imagination  of  a  maiden  could  put  into 
her  voice  and  words.  Then  she  turned 
and  went  out.  She  heard  Sarah's  con 
vulsive  sobs  as  she  went,  but  she  felt 
pitiless.  The  sitting-room  door  was 
open  and  her  mother  was  sewing  by  the 
lamp,  with  its  flowered  shade.  Maria 
cast  a  glance  at  her,  and  knew  that  she 

4  53 


SIX    TREES 

would  be  questioned  curiously,  and 
opened  the  front  door  and  went  down 
the  walk  between  the  rows  of  flowering 
bushes — pinks  and  peonies  and  yellow 
lilies.  The  katydids  were  singing  very 
loud  and  shrill  across  the  way.  Some 
how  she  felt  a  sort  of  futile  anger  at 
the  sound.  The  ceaseless  reverbera 
tions  of  nature  which  pertained  to  its 
perpetuation  irritated  her.  It  was  the 
voice  of  a  law  under  which  she  would 
never  come,  which  she  did  not  in  her 
heart  recognize,  which,  when  she  saw 
it  applied  to  others,  filled  her  with  im 
patience  and  repulsion. 

When  she  reached  the  gate,  she  stood 
still,  leaning  against  it,  and  a  man's 
figure  loomed  up  before  her.  She  did 
not  start;  she  was  not  a  nervous  girl; 
she  looked  intently  and  recognized  him 
in  a  moment. 

54 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

"  Is  it  you,  Harry?"  she  said,  in  a  low 
voice. 

The  man  came  closer.  "Yes,"  he 
said,  with  a  sort  of  gasp.  Then  he 
leaned  heavily  against  the  gate,  and  put 
his  head  down  upon  it  with  a  sort  of 
despairing  gesture  like  a  child. 

Maria  stood  watching  him,  not  so 
much  pityingly  as  angrily.  She  thought 
to  herself  how  could  any  man  make 
such  a  fool  of  himself  over  a  girl  like 
that  in  there. 

But  she  waited,  and  presently  spoke 
in  a  low,  soft  voice,  that  her  mother 
might  not  hear.  "  What's  the  matter? 
Are  you  sick?" 

"  Tell  me,  Maria,  is  she  going  to  marry 
Joseph  Lynn?"  gasped  the  young  fellow, 
with  an  agonized  roll  of  black  eyes  at 
her. 

"So  she  says." 

55 


SIX    TREES 

"I  wish  I  was  dead." 

"  It  ain't  right  to  talk  so." 

"You  don't  know  how  I  feel," 
groaned  the  young  man,  and  that  was 
perfectly  true.  "  I've  just  got  a  job, 
too,"  said  he,  "and  I  came  down  here, 
and  I  saw  him  going  away,  and  I  wish  I 
was  dead." 

The  gate  opened  inward.  Maria  be 
gan  pulling  at  it.  "Here,  come  in," 
said  she. 

"What  use  is  there,  when — " 

"Come  in,"  said  Maria,  imperatively, 
pulling  at  the  gate. 

The  young  man  yielded.  He  followed 
Maria  into  the  house.  Sarah  was  still 
sobbing.  They  could  hear  her  the  mo 
ment  they  entered  the  front  entry. 
Maria's  mother  had  not  noticed,  be 
cause  she  was  slightly  deaf. 

Maria  took  the  young  man  by  the 

56 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

arm,  and  almost  forced  him  into  the 
parlor.  "Here  he  is,"  said  she,  in  a 
curious  voice,  almost  as  if  she  were  a 
being  of  another  race,  and  spoke  from 
the  outside  of  things.  "  Here  is  Harry 
Wyman,  and  he's  got  another  job,  and 
if  you've  got  a  mite  of  shame  you'll 
marry  him  instead  of  Joseph  Lynn, 
Sadie  Benton." 

Then  she  shut  the  parlor  door  and 
went  into  the  sitting-room. 

Her  mother  looked  up  with  a  start; 
she  had  shut  the  parlor  door  with  a 
bang. 

"Who's  in  there  now?"  she  whis 
pered. 

"Harry  Wyman." 

"For  the  land's  sake!  Which  is  she 
goin'  to  marry?" 

"  I  don't  know.  I  don't  see  what  any 
woman  who  is  earning  her  own  livin' 
57 


SIX    TREES 

wants  to  get  married  for,  anyhow/'  said 
Maria.  "  You  go  to  bed,  mother,  if  you 
want  to." 

"  Do  you  know  how  long  he's  goin'  to 
stay?" 

"No,  but  I'll  sit  up  and  lock  the 
door." 

"She'll  never  think  of  it,  she's  so 
heedless." 

"  I  told  you  7  would,  mother." 

Joseph  Lynn  had  made  all  his  prep 
arations  to  move  his  house  to  the  edge 
of  the  highway.  Sarah  had  complained 
that  it  was  too  far  from  the  road,  that 
she  wanted  to  see  the  passing.  The 
very  next  morning  men  assembled  with 
jacks  and  timbers  loaded  on  a  wagon, 
and  the  heavy  old  horse  which  had 
drawn  them  was  taken  out  and  tied  to  a 
tree  which  he  tried  to  nibble,  and  the 
58 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

men  were  about  beginning  their  task 
when  Harry  Wyman  came.  He  looked 
pale,  both  shamed  and  triumphant. 
He  went  up  to  Joseph,  who  surveyed 
him  with  a  kindly  air.  He  had  known 
the  young  fellow  ever  since  he  was  a 
baby.  He  had  never  been  jealous  of 
him,  although  he  had  heard  his  name 
coupled  with  his  sweetheart's.  He  was 
not  a  jealous  man,  and  believed  in  a 
promise  as  he  believed  in  the  return  of 
the  spring. 

"Hello,  Harry!"  he  said.  "Want  a 
job?" 

"No,  thank  you;  I've  got  one." 

"  Oh.  I  heard  you  were  out  of  work, 
and  thought  mebbe  I  could  give  you  a 
lift." 

The  young  man  stood  before  the  elder 
one,  still  with  that  mixture  of  triumph 
and  shame.  He  could  not  speak  out 
59 


SIX    TREES 

his  errand  at  once.  He  hedged.  "  Goin' 
to  move  the  old  house?"  he  said, 
huskily. 

4 'Yes;  then  I'm  goin'  to  have  her 
painted  up  and  shingled,  and  a  bay- 
winder  put  on,  and  get  some  new  furni 
ture.  Suppose  you've  heard  I'm  goin' 
to  be  married?" 

"Yes,  I've  heard,"  said  the  young 
man.  He  turned  perceptibly  paler. 

Joseph  stared  at  him  with  sudden 
concern .  ' '  What  in  creation  ails  you  ? ' ' 
he  said.  "  Be  you  sick?  Want  any 
thing  to  take?" 

"No.     Look  here—  " 

Harry  drew  him  aside  and  told  him. 
"She's  liked  me  best  all  the  time,"  he 
said.  "You  won't  be  hard  on  her,  Mr. 
Lynn?" 

Joseph's  face  was  ghastly,  but  he  lost 
not  one  atom  of  his  stiffness  of  bearing. 
60 


'"SUPPOSE  YOU'VE  HEARD  I'M  COIN'  TO  BE  MARRIED?'" 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

He  was  like  a  tree  that  even  the  winds 
of  heaven  could  not  bend.  "  If  she  likes 
you  best,  that's  all  there  is  to  be  said 
about  it,"  he  replied,  and  his  voice, 
although  it  was  quite  steady,  seemed 
to  come  from  far  away. 

"I  hope  you  won't  lay  it  up  against 
her.  She's  a  little,  delicate  thing,  and 
I'd  lost  my  job,  and — " 

"If  she  likes  you  better,  that's  all 
there  is  to  say  about  it,"  repeated  Jo 
seph,  in  a  tone  so  hardly  conclusive  that 
the  young  fellow  jumped. 

He  went  away  with  a  leaping  motion 
of  joy,  in  spite  of  himself. 

Then  Joseph  went  up  to  the  men  who 
were  dragging  the  heavy  timbers  tow 
ards  the  old  house.  "I'll  give  you 
what  your  time  and  labor  of  bringin' 
'em  here  is  worth,"  he  said.  As  he 
spoke  he  drew  out  his  old  pocket-book. 
61 


SIX    TREES 

The  men  all  stared  at  him.  He  be 
came  the  target  of  gaping  faces,  but  he 
did  not  quail. 

"  'Ain't  you  goin'  to  have  the  house 
moved,  after  all?"  asked  one  man,  with 
a  bewildered  air. 

"No;  changed  my  mind.  Goin'  to 
let  her  set  where  she  is.  I'll  pay  you 
whatever  your  time  and  labor's  worth." 

After  Joseph  had  paid  the  men,  and 
had  seen  the  heavy  old  horse  lumber 
across  the  field  with  his  burden,  he  en 
tered  his  house.  There  had  been  a 
little  digging  under  one  of  the  walls; 
otherwise  it  had  been  untouched.  He 
noticed  that,  and  reflected  that  he 
would  make  it  right  before  sundown. 
A  clump  of  pinks  had  been  uprooted. 
He  carried  them  into  the  house,  and  put 
them  in  a  pitcher  of  water,  and  they 
filled  the  room  with  their  spicy  fra- 
62 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

grance.  Joseph  lived  entirely  alone,  yet 
the  house  was  very  orderly.  He  had 
planned  to  do  most  of  the  housework 
himself  after  he  was  married,  and  save 
Sarah. 

Joseph  sat  down  awhile  in  the  old 
rocking-chair  beside  the  sitting-room 
window,  and  his  heart  ached  as  if  it 
were  breaking.  He  could  scarcely  be 
lieve  in  the  reality  of  that  which  had 
befallen  him;  there  was  in  his  soul  an 
awful  pain  of  readjustment  to  its  old 
ways.  But,  after  all,  he  had  passed  his 
youth  and  his  time  of  acutest  re 
bellion.  After  a  while  he  heard  a  flut 
ing  note  of  a  bird  close  to  the  house, 
and  it  sounded  in  his  ears  like  a  primal 
comfort -note  of  nature.  All  at  once 
he  was  distinctly  conscious  of  a  feeling 
of  gladness  that  the  goor  old  house  was 
not  to  be  torn  up  by  its  roots  like  the 
63 


SIX    TREES 

clump  of  pinks,  and  set  in  alien  soil. 
He  had  lived  in  the  house  so  long  that  at 
times  it  seemed  fairly  alive  to  him,  and 
something  which  could  be  hurt.  He 
looked  at  the  walls  lovingly.  "  Might 
have  weakened  'em,"  he  said,  "and  I 
always  liked  this  old  satin  paper." 

He  looked  out  of  the  window,  and  the 
silvery  shimmer  of  the  birches  and  their 
white  gleam  of  limb  caught  his  eye.  He 
got  up  heavily,  put  on  his  old  straw  hat, 
went  out  of  the  house,  and  the  solitary 
birch  which  had  been  bereft  of  her  sisters 
was  very  near.  He  flung  himself  down 
beside  her,  and  leaned  against  her  frail, 
swaying  body,  and,  felt  her  silvery  skin 
against  his  cheek,Y^nd  all  at  once  the 
dearness  of  that  which  is  always  left  in 
the  treasure-house  of  nature  for  those 
who  are  robbed  came  over  him  and 
satisfied  him.  He  loved  the  girl  as  he 
64 


THE    WHITE    BIRCH 

had  never  loved  her  before,  and  his  love 
was  so  great  and  unselfish  and  inno 
cent  that  it  overweighed  his  loss,  and 
it  was  to  him  as  if  he  had  not  lost  her 
at  all.  With  no  pain  he  began  to  think 
of  her  as  the  bride  of  the  other  man. 

"He  was  always  a  good  fellow,"  he 
said,  "and  she  ought  to  marry  a  man 
nearer  her  own  age." 

He  sat  a  long  time  leaning  against 
the  white  birch  -  tree  through  whose 
boughs  a  soft  wind  came  at  intervals, 
and  made  a  gentle,  musical  rustle  of 
twinkling  leaves,  and  the  tree  did  not 
fairly  know  that  the  wind  was  not 
stirring  the  leaves  of  her  lost  sisters,  and 
the  man's  love  and  sense  of  primeval 
comfort  were  so  great  that  he  was  still 
filled  with  the  peace  of  possession. 


THE    GREAT    PINE 


[T  was  in  the  summer-time 
that  the  great  pine  sang 
his  loudest  song  of  winter, 
for  always  the  voice  of 
the  tree  seemed  to  arouse 
in  the  listener  a  realization  of  that  which 
was  past  and  to  come,  rather  than  of 
the  present.  In  the  winter  the  tree 
seemed  to  sing  of  the  slumberous  peace 
under  his  gently  fanning  boughs,  and 
the  deep  swell  of  his  aromatic  breath 
in  burning  noons,  and  when  the  sum 
mer  traveller  up  the  mountain  -  side 
threw  himself,  spent  and  heated,  be 
neath  his  shade,  then  the  winter  song 
69 


V 


SIX    TREES 

was  at  its  best.  When  the  wind 
swelled  high  came  the  song  of  the  ice 
fields,  of  the  frozen  mountain-torrents, 
of  the  trees  wearing  hoary  beards  and 
bent  double  like  old  men,  of  the  little 
wild  things  trembling  in  their  covers 
when  the  sharp  reports  of  the  frost 
sounded  through  the  rigid  hush  of  the 
arctic  night  and  death  was  abroad. 
The  man  who  lay  beneath  the  tree  had 
much  uncultivated  imagination,  and, 
though  hampered/  by  exceeding  igno 
rance,  he^yet  sa^and  heard  that  which 
was  beyond  mere  observation.  When 
exhausted  by  the  summer  heat,  he  re 
flected  upon  the  winter  with  that  keen 
pleasure  which  comes  from  the  mental 
grasp  of  contrast  to  discomfort.  He 
did  not  know  that  he  heard  the  voice  of 
the  tree  and  not  his  own  thought,  so 
did  the  personality  of  the  great  pine 
70 


HAD    CLIMBKD    DIFFERENT    HEIGHTS    FROM    MOUNTAINS 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

mingle  with  his  own.  He  was  a  sailor, 
and  had  climbed  different  heights  from 
mountains,  even  masts  made  from  the 
kindred  of  the  tree. 

Presently  he  threw  his  head  back, 
and  stared  up  and  up,  and  reflected 
what  a  fine  mast  the  tree  would  make, 
if  only  it  were  not  soft  pine.  There  was 
a  stir  in  a  branch,  and  a  bird  which 
lived  in  the  tree  in  summer  cast  a  small, 
wary  glance  at  him  from  an  eye  like  a 
point  of  bright  intelligence,  but  the  man 
did  not  see  it.  He  drew  a  long  breath, 
and  looked  irresolutely  at  the  upward 
slope  beyond  the  tree.  It  was  time  for 
him  to  be  up  and  on  if  he  would  cross 
the  mountain  before  nightfall.  He  was 
a  wayfarer  without  resources.  He  was 
as  poor  as  the  tree,  or  any  of  the 
wild  creatures  which  were  in  hiding 
around  him  on  the  mountain.  He 

*  71 


SIX    TREES 

was  even  poorer,  for  he  had  not  their 
feudal  tenure  of  an  abiding-place  for 
root  and  foot  on  the  mountain  by  the 
inalienable  right  of  past  generations  of 
his  race.  Even  the  little,  wary  -  eyed, 
feathered  thing  had  its  small  freehold 
in  the  branches  of  the  great  pine,  but 
the  man  had  nothing.  He  had  re 
turned  to  primitive  conditions;  he  was 
portionless  save  for  that  with  which  he 
came  into  the  world,  except  for  two 
garments  which  were  nearly  past  their 
use  as  such.  His  skin  showed  through 
the  rents;  the  pockets  were  empty. 
["Adam  expelled  from  Eden  was  not  in 
much  worse  case,  and  this  man  also 
L.  had  at  his  back  the  flaming  sword  of 
punishment  for  wrong-doing.  The  man 
arose.  He  stood  for  a  moment,  letting 
the  cool  wind  fan  his  forehead  a  little 
longer;  then  he  bent  his  shoulders 
72 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

doggedly  and  resumed  his  climb  up 
the  dry  bed  of  a  brook  which  was  in 
winter  a  fierce  conduit  for  the  melting 
ice  and  snow.  Presently  he  came  to 
such  a  choke  of  fallen  trees  across  the 
bed  that  he  had  to  leave  it;  then  there 
was  a  sheer  rock  ascent  which  he  had 
to  skirt  and  go  lower  down  the  moun 
tain  to  avoid. 

The  tree  was  left  alone.  He  stood 
quiescent  with  the  wind  in  his  green 
plumes.  He  belonged  to  that  simplest 
form  of  life  which  cannot  project  itself 
beyond  its  own  existence  to  judge  of  it. 
He  did  not  know  when  presently  the 
man  returned  and  threw  himself  down 
with  a  violent  thud  against  his  trunk, 
though  there  was  a  slight  shock  to  his 
majesty.  But  the  man  looked  up  at  the 
tree  and  cursed  it.  He  had  lost  his  way 
through  avoiding  the  rocky  precipice, 
73 


SIX    TREES 

and  had  circled  back  to  the  tree.  He 
remained  there  a  few  minutes  to  gain 
breath;  then  he  rose,  for  the  western 
sunlight  was  filtering  in  gold  drops 
through  the  foliage  below  the  pine, 
and  plodded  heavily  on  again. 

It  might  have  been  twenty  minutes 
before  he  returned.  When  he  saw  the 
pine  he  cursed  more  loudly  than  before. 
The  sun  was  quite  low.  The  mountain 
seemed  to  be  growing  in  size,  the  val 
leys  were  fast  becoming  gulfs  of  black 
mystery.  The  man  looked  at  the  tree 
malignantly.  He  felt  in  his  pocket  for 
a  knife  which  he  used  to  own,  then  for 
a  match,  the  accompaniment  of  the  to 
bacco  and  pipe  which  formerly  comfort 
ed  him,  but  there  was  none  there.  The 
thought  of  the  lost  pipe  and  tobacco 
filled  him  with  a  childish  savagery.  He 
felt  that  he  must  vent  his  spite  upon 
74 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

something  outside  himself.  He  picked 
up  two  dry  sticks,  and  began  rubbing 
them  together.  He  had  some  skill  in 
woodcraft.  Presently  a  spark  gleamed ; 
then  another.  He  scraped  up  a  handful 
of  dry  leaves.  Presently  smoke  arose 
pungently  in  his  face,  then  a  flame 
leaped  to  life.  The  man  kept  on  his 
way,  leaving  a  fire  behind  him,  and 
swore  with  an  oath  that  he  would  not 
be  trapped  by  the  tree  again. 

He  struggled  up  the  old  waterway, 
turning  aside  for  the  prostrate  skele 
tons  of  giant  trees,  clambering  over 
heaps  of  stones  which  might  have  been 
the  cairns  of  others,  and  clawing  up 
precipices  like  a  panther.  After  one 
fierce  scramble  he  paused  for  breath, 
and,  standing  on  a  sheer  rock  ledge, 
gazed  downward.  Below  him  was  a 
swaying,  folding  gloom  full  of  vague 
75 


SIX    TREES 

whispers  and  rustlings.  It  seemed  to 
wave  and  eddy  before  him  like  the  sea 
from  the  deck  of  a  ship,  and,  indeed,  it 
was  another  deep,  only  of  air  instead 
of  water.  Suddenly  he  realized  that 
there  was  no  light,  that  the  fire  which  he 
had  kindled  must  have  gone  out.  He 
stared  into  the  waving  darkness  below, 
and  sniffed  hard.  He  could  smell 
smoke  faintly,  although  he  could  see  no 
fire.  Then  all  at  once  came  a  gleam  of 
red,  then  a  leap  of  orange  flame.  Then — 
no  human  being  could  have  told  how  it 
happened,  he  himself  least  of  all,  what 
swift  motive  born  of  deeds  and  experi 
ences  in  his  own  life,  born  perhaps  of 
deeds  and  experiences  of  long-dead  an 
cestors,  actuated  him.  He  leaped  back 
down  the  mountain,  stumbling  headlong, 
falling  at  times,  and  scrambled  to  his 
feet  again,  sending  loose  stones  down 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

in  avalanches,  running  risks  of  life  and 
limb,  but  never  faltering  until  he  was 
beside  the  pine,  standing,  singing  in 
the  growing  glare  of  the  fire.  Then  he 
began  beating  the  fire  fiercely  with 
sticks,  trampling  it  until  he  blistered 
his  feet.  At  last  the  fire  was  out.  Peo 
ple  on  a  hotel  piazza  down  in  the  valley, 
who  had  been  watching  it,  turned  away. 
"The  fire  is  out,"  they  said,  with  the 
regret  of  those  who  miss  a  spectacular 
delight,  although  admitting  the  pity  and 
shame  of  it,  yet  coddling  with  fierce 
and  defiant  joy  the  secret  lust  of  de 
struction  of  the  whole  race.  "The  fire 
is  out,"  they  said;  but  more  than  the 
fire  had  burned  low,  and  was  out,  on 
the  mountain.  The  man  who  had 
evoked  destruction  to  satisfy  his  own 
wrath  and  bitterness  of  spirit,  and  then 
repented,  sat  for  a  few  minutes  out  side  _A 
77 


SIX    TREES 

the  blackened  circle  around  the  great 
pine,  breathing  hard.  He  drew  his 
rough  coat-sleeve  across  his  wet  fore 
head,  and  stared  up  at  the  tree,  which 
loomed  above  him  like  a  prophet  with 
solemnly  waving  arms  of  benediction, 
prophesying  in  a  great  unknown  lan 
guage  of  his  own.  He  gaped  as  he 
stared;  his  face  looked  vacant.  He 
felt  in  his  pocket  for  his  departed  pipe, 
then  withdrew  his  hand  forcibly,  dash 
ing  it  against  the  ground.  Then  he 
sighed,  swore  mildly  under  his  breath 
an  oath  of  weariness  and  misery  rather 
than  of  wrath.  Then  he  pulled  him 
self  up  by  successive  stages  of  his  stiff 
muscles,  like  an  old  camel,  and  resumed 
his  journey. 

After  a  while  he  again  paused  and 
looked  back.  The  moon  had  arisen, 
and  he  could  see  quite  plainly  the  great 

78 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

pine  standing  crowned  with  white  light, 
tossing  his  boughs  like  spears  and 
lances  of  silver.  * '  Thunderin'  big  tree, ' ' 
he  muttered,  with  a  certain  pride  and 
self  -  approbation.  He  felt  that  that 
majestic  thing  owed  its  being  to  him, 
to  his  forbearance  with  his  own  hard 
fate.  Had  it  not  been  for  that  it 
would  have  been  a  mere  blackened 
trunk.  At  that  moment,  for  the  first 
time  in  his  history,  he  rose  superior  to 
his  own  life.  In  some  unknown  fashion 
this  seemingly  trivial  happening  had, 
as  it  were,  tuned  him  to  a  higher  place 
in  the  scale  of  things  than  he  had  ever 
held.  He,  through  saving  the  tree  from 
himself,  gained  a  greater  spiritual 
growth  than  the  tree  had  gained  in 
height  since  it  first  quickened  with  life. 
Who  shall  determine  the  limit  at  which 
the  intimate  connection  and  reciprocal 
79 


SIX    TREES 

influence  of  all  forms  of  visible  creation 
upon  one  another  may  stop?  A  man 
may  cut  down  a  tree  and  plant  one. 
Who  knows  what  effect  the  tree  may 
have  upon  the  man,  to  his  raising  or 
undoing? 

Presently  the  man  frowned  and 
shook  his  head  in  a  curious  fashion,  as 
if  he  questioned  his  own  identity ;  then 
he  resumed  his  climb.  After  the  sum 
mit  was  gained  he  went  down  the  other 
side  of  the  mountain,  then  northward 
through  a  narrow  gorge  of  valley  to 
which  the  moonbeams  did  not  yet  pen 
etrate.  This  valley,  between  mighty 
walls  of  silver-crested  darkness,  was  ter 
rifying.  The  man  felt  his  own  smallness 
and  the  largeaess  of  nature  which  seemed 
about  to  fall  upon  him.  Spirit  was  in 
timidated  by  mattdr  The  man,  rude 
and  unlettered,  brutalized  and  dulled 
89 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

by  his  life,  yet  realized  it.  He  rolled 
his  eyes  aloft  from  side  to  side,  and  ran 
as  if  pursued. 

When  he  had  reached  the  brow  of 
a  little  decline  in  the  valley  road  he 
paused  and  searched  eagerly  with 
straining  eyes  the  side  of  the  mountain 
on  the  right.  Then  he  drew  a  long 
breath  of  relief.  He  had  seen  what 
he  wished  to  see — a  feeble  glimmer  of 
lamplight  from  a  window  of  a  house, 
the  only  one  on  that  lonely  road  for  five 
miles  in  either  direction.  It  was  the 
dwelling  -  house  on  a  small  farm  which 
had  been  owned  by  the  father  of  the 
woman  whom  the  man  had  married 
fifteen  years  before.  Ten  years  ago, 
when  he  had  run  away,  there  had  been 
his  wife,  his  little  girl,  and  his  wife's 
mother  living  on  the  farm.  The  old 
farmer  father  had  died  two  years  before 
81 


SIX    TREES 

that,  and  the  man ,  who  had  wild  blood 
in  his  veins,  had  rebelled  at  the  hard 
grind  necessary  to  wrest  a  livelihood 
by  himself  from  the  mountain  soil.  So 
one  morning  he  was  gone,  leaving  a 
note  saying  that  he  had  gone  to  sea, 
and  would  write  and  send  money,  that 
he  could  earn  more  than  on  a  farm. 
But  he  never  wrote,  and  he  never  sent 
the  money.  He  had  met  with  sin  and 
disaster,  and  at  last  he  started  home 
ward,  shorn,  and,  if  not  repentant,  weary 
of  wrong-doing  and  its  hard  wages.  He 
had  retreated  from  the  broad  way  with 
an  ignoble  impulse,  desiring  the  safety 

\s\^/^~&\^/\/\^^~~ 

Aof   the    narrow,    and    the    loaves    and 

'  fishes,  which,  after  all,  can  be  found  in 

i  it  with  greater  certainty;  but  now,  as 

he  hastened  along,  he  became  conscious 

of   something  better  than  that.     Qne 

good  impulse  begat  others  by  some  law 

82 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

of  spiritual  reproduction.  He  began 
to  think  how  he  would  perhaps  do  more 
work  than  he  had  formerly,  and  please 
his  wife  and  her  mother. 

He  looked  at  the  light  in  the  window 
ahead  with  something  akin  to  thank 
fulness.  He  remembered  how  very 
gentle  his  wife  had  been,  and  how  fond 
of  him.  His  wife's  mother  also  had 
been  a  mild  woman,  with  reproving 
eyes  only,  never  with  a  tongue  of  re 
proach.  He  remembered  his  little  girl 
with  a  thrill  of  tenderness  and  curiosity. 
She  would  be  a  big  girl  now ;  she  would 
be  like  her  mother.  He  began  pictur 
ing  to  himself  what  they  would  do  and 
say,  what  they  would  give  him  for 
supper.  He  thought  he  would  like  a 
slice  of  ham  cut  from  one  of  those  cured 
on  the  farm,  that  and  some  new-laid 
eggs.  He  would  have  some  of  those 
83 


SIX    TREES 

biscuits  that  his  wife's  mother  used  to 
make,  and  some  fresh  butter,  and  honey 
from  the  home  bees.  He  would  have 
tea  and  cream.  He  seemed  to  smell  the 
tea  and  the  ham.  A  hunger  which  was 
sorer  than  any  hunger  of  the  flesh  came 
over  him.  All  at  once  the  wanderer 
starved  for  home.  He  had  been  ship 
wrecked  and  at  the  point  of  death 
from  hunger,  but  never  was  hunger  like 
this.  He  had  planned  speeches  of  con 
trition;  now  he  planned  nothing.  He 
feared  no  blame  from  those  whom  he 
had  wronged;  he  feared  nothing  ex 
cept  his  own  need  of  them.  Faster  and 
faster  he  went.  He  seemed  to  be  run 
ning  a  race.  At  last  he  was  quite  close 
to  the  house.  The  light  was  in  a  win 
dow  facing  the  road,  and  the  curtain 
was  up.  He  could  see  a  figure  steadily 
passing  and  repassing  it.  He  went 
84 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

closer,  and  saw  that  it  was  a  little  girl 
with  a  baby  in  her  arms,  and  she  was 
walking  up  and  down  hushing  it.  A 
feeble  cry  smote  his  ears,  though  the 
doors  and  windows  were  closed.  It  was 
chilly  even  in  midsummer  in  the  moun 
tains.  He  went  around  the  house  to  the 
side  door.  He  noticed  that  the  field 
on  the  left  was  waving  with  tall,  dry 
grass,  which  should  have  been  cut  long 
ago ;  he  noticed  that  there  were  no  bean 
poles  in  the  garden.  He  noticed  that 
the  house  looked  gray  and  shabby  even 
in  the  moonlight,  that  some  blinds  were 
gone  and  a  window  broken.  He  leaned 
a  second  against  the  door.  Then  he 
opened  it  and  entered.  He  came  into 
a  little,  square  entry ;  on  one  side  was 
the  kitchen  door,  on  the  other  the  room 
where  the  light  was.  He  opened  the 
door  leading  to  this  room.  He  stood 
85 


SIX    TREES 

staring,  for  nothing  which  he  had  antici 
pated  met  his  eyes,  except  the  little  girl. 
She  stood  gazing  at  him,  half  in  alarm, 
half  in  surprise,  clutching  close  the 
baby,  which  was  puny,  but  evidently 
about  a  year  old.  Two  little  boys  stood 
near  the  table  on  which  the  lamp  was 
burning,  and  they  stared  at  him  with 
wide-open  mouths  and  round  eyes. 
But  the  sight  which  filled  the  intruder 
with  the  most  amazement  and  dismay 
was  that  of  a  man  in  the  bed  in  the 
corner.  He  recognized  him  at  once  as 
a  farmer  who  had  lived ,  at  the  time  of 
his  departure,  five  miles  away  in  the 
village.  He  remembered  that  his  wife 
was  recently  dead  when  he  left.  The 
man,  whose  blue,  ghastly  face  was 
sunken  in  the  pillows,  looked  up  at  him. 
He  thrust  out  a  cadaverous  hand  as  if 
to  threaten.  The  little  girl  with  the 
86 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

baby  and  the  two  little  boys  edged 
nearer  the  bed,  as  if  for  protection. 

"Who  be  you?"  inquired  the  sick 
man,  with  feeble  menace.  "What  d'  ye 
want  comin'  in  here  this  way?"  It  was 
like  the  growl  of  a  sick  dog. 

The  other  man  went  close  to  the  bed. 
"Where  is  my  wife?"  he  asked,  in  a 
strange  voice.  It  was  expressive  of 
horror  and  anger  and  a  rage  of  disap 
pointment. 

"You  ain't — Dick?"  gasped  the  man 
in  bed. 

"Yes,  I  be;  and  I  know  you,  Johnny 
Willet.  Where  is  my  wife?  What  are 
you  here  for?" 

"Your  wife  is  dead,"  answered  the 
man,  in  a  choking  voice.  He  began  to 
cough;  he  half  raised  himself  on  one 
elbow.  His  eyes  bulged.  He  crowed 
like  a  child  with  the  croup.  The  little 

«  87 


SIX    TREES 

girl  promptly  laid  the  baby  on  the  bed 
and  ran  to  a  chimney  cupboard  for  a 
bottle  of  medicine,  which  she  adminis 
tered  with  a  spoon.  The  sick  man  lay 
back,  gasping  for  breath.  He  looked 
as  if  already  dead;  his  jaw  dropped; 
there  were  awful  blue  hollows  in  his 
face. 

"Dead!"  repeated  the  visitor,  think 
ing  of  his  wife,  and  not  of  the  other 
image  of  death  before  him. 

"Yes,  she's  dead." 

" Where's  my  little  girl?" 

The  sick  man  raised  one  shaking 
hand  and  pointed  to  the  little  girl  who 
had  taken  up  the  whimpering  baby. 

"That?" 

The  sick  man  nodded. 

The  other  eyed  the  little  girl ,  rather 
tall  for  her  age,  but  very  slim,  her  nar 
row  shoulders  already  bent  with  toil. 
88 


THE   GREAT    PINE 

She  regarded  him,  with  serious  blue 
eyes  in  a  little  face,  with  an  expression 
of  gentleness  so  pronounced  that  it 
gave  the  impression  of  a  smile.  The 
man's  eyes  wandered  from  the  girl  to 
the  baby  in  her  arms  and  the  two  little 
boys. 

"What  be  you  all  a-doin'  here?"  he 
demanded,  gruffly,  and  made  a  move 
ment  towards  the  bed.  The  little  girl 
turned  pale,  and  clutched  the  baby  more 
closely.  The  sick  man  made  a  fee 
ble  sound  of  protest  and  deprecation. 
"What  be  you  all  a-doin'  here?"  de 
manded  the  other  again. 

"  I  married  your  wife  after  we  heard 
your  ship  was  lost.  We  knew  you  was 
aboard  her  from  Abel  Dennison.  He 
come  home,  and  said  you  was  dead*  for 
sure,  some  eight  year  ago,  and  then  she 
said  she'd  marry  me.  I'd  been  after 
89 


SIX    TREES 

her  some  time.  My  wife  died,  and  my 
house  burned  down,  and  I  was  left 
alone  without  any  home,  and  I'd  always 
liked  her.  She  wasn't  any  too  willin', 
but  finally  she  give  in." 

The  man  whom  he  had  called  Dick 
glared  at  him  speechlessly. 

"We  both  thought  you  was  dead, 
sure,"  said  the  sick  man,  in  a  voice  of 
mild  deprecation,  which  was  ludicrously 
out  of  proportion  to  the  subject. 

Dick  looked  at  the  children. 

"We  had  'em,"  said  the  sick  man. 
"She  died  when  the  baby  was  two 
months  old,  and  your  girl  Lottie  has 
been  taking  care  of  it.  It  has  been 
pretty  hard  for  her,  but  I  was  took  sick, 
and  'ain't  been  able  to  do  anything.  I 
can  jest  crawl  round  a  little,  and  that's 
all.  Lottie  can  milk — we've  got  one 
cow  left — and  she  feeds  the  hens,  and 
90 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

my  first  wife's  brother  has  given  us 
some  flour  and  meal,  and  cuts  up  some 
wood  to  burn,  and  we've  worried  along, 
but  we  can't  stand  it  when  winter 
comes,  anyhow.  Somethin'  has  got  to 
be  done."  Suddenly  an  expression  of 
blank  surprise  before  an  acquisition  of 
knowledge  came  over  his  face.  "Good 
Lord!  Dick,"  he  gasped  out,  "it's  all 
yours.  It's  all  yours,  anyway,  now." 

"Where's  the  old  woman?"  asked 
Dick,  abruptly,  ignoring  what  the  other 
said. 

"Your  wife's  mother?  She  died  of 
pneumonia  about  two  year  ago.  Your 
wife  she  took  it  to  heart  pretty  bad. 
She  was  a  heap  of  help  about  the 
children." 

Dick  nodded.  "The  old  woman  al 
ways  was  smart  to  work,"  he  as 
sented. 


SIX    TREES 

"  Yes,  and  your  wife  she  wa'n't  over- 
strong." 

"  Never  was." 

"No." 

"  S'pose  there  was  enough  to  put  her 
away  decent?" 

"I  sold  the  wood -lot  on  the  back 
road.  There's  a  gravestone.  Luckily 
I  had  it  done  before  I  was  took  sick." 

"  S'pose  you're  pretty  hard  pinched 
now?" 

"  Awful  hard.  We  can't  get  along  so 
much  longer.  There's  enough  wood  to 
cut,  if  I  could  do  it,  that  would  bring  in 
somethin';  and  there's  the  hay,  that's 
spoilin'.  I  can't  do  nothin'.  There's 
nothin'  but  this  house  over  our  heads." 
Suddenly  that  look  of  surprised  knowl 
edge  came  over  his  face  again.  "Lord! 
it's  all  yours,  and  the  girl's,  anyhow," 
he  muttered. 

92 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

" She's  been  doin'  the  work?"  asked 
Dick,  pointing  to  the  girl. 

"Yes;  she  does  the  best  she  can,  but 
she  ain't  very  big,  and  the  children 
'ain't  got  enough  to  be  decent,  and  we 
can't  get  much  cooked." 

Dick  made  a  resolute  step  towards  the 
door. 

"Where be  you  a-goin',  Dick?"  asked 
the  sick  man,  with  a  curious  wistfulness. 
"You  ain't  goin'  to-night?" 

"What  is  there  in  the  house  to  eat?" 

"  What's  in  the  house,  Lottie? " 

"There's  some  meal  and  milk  and 
eggs,"  answered  the  child,  in  a  high, 
sweet  voice. 

"Come  here  and  give  us  a  kiss, 
Lottie,"  said  Dick,  suddenly. 

The  little  girl  approached  him  timidly, 
staggering  under  the  weight  of  the  baby. 
She  lifted  her  face,  and  the  man  kissed 
93 


SIX    TREES 

her  with   a   sort  of  solemnity.     "I'm 
your  father,  Lottie,"  said  he. 

The  two  looked  at  each  other,  the 
child  shrinking,  yet  smiling. 

"  Glad  I  got  home?"  asked  the  man. 

"Yes,  sir." 

Dick  went  out  into  the  kitchen,  and 
the  children  followed  and  stood  in  the 
doorway,  watching.  He  gravely  set  to 
work  with  such  utensils  and  materials 
as  he  found,  which  were  scanty  enough. 
He  kindled  a  fire  and  made  a  corn-cake. 
He  made  porridge  for  the  sick  man  and 
carried  him  a  bowl  of  it  smoking  hot. 
;<  'Ain't  had  nothin'  like  this  sence  she 
died,"  said  the  sick  man. 

After  supper  Dick  cleaned  the  kitchen. 
He  also  tidied  up  the  other  room  and 
made  the  bed,  and  milked,  and  split 
some  wood  wherewith  to  cook  break 
fast. 

94 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

"You  ain't  goin'  to-night,  Dick?" 
the  sick  man  said,  anxiously,  when  he 
came  in  after  the  work  was  done. 

"No,  I  ain't." 

"Lord!  I  forgot;  it's  your  house," 
said  the  sick  man. 

"  I  wa'n't  goin'  anyhow,"  said  Dick. 

"Well,  there's  a  bed  up-stairs.  You 
'ain't  got  any  more  clothes  than  what 
you've  got  on,  have  you?" 

"No,  I  'ain't,"  replied  Dick,  Portly. 

"Well,  there's  mine  in  the  closet  out 
of  this  room,  and  you  might  jest  as  well 
wear  'em  till  I  get  up.  There's  some 
shirts  and  some  pants." 

"All  right,"  said  Dick. 

The  next  morning  Dick  got  the 
breakfast,  cooking  eggs  with  wonderful 
skill  and  frying  corn -cakes.  Then, 
dressed  in  the  sick  man's  shirt  and 
trousers,  he  set  forth,  axe  in  hand.  He 
95 


SIX    TREES 

toiled  all  day  in  the  woods;  he  toiled 
every  day  until  he  had  sufficient  wood 
cut,  then  he  hired  a  horse,  to  be  paid 
for  when  the  wood  was  sold.  He  carted 
loads  to  the  hotels  and  farm-houses 
where  summer  -  boarders  were  taken. 
He  arose  before  dawn  and  worked  in  the 
field  and  garden.  He  cut  the  hay.  He 
was  up  half  the  night  setting  the  house 
to  rights.  He  washed  and  ironed  like 
a  womati.  The  whole  establishment 
was  transformed.  He  got  a  doctor  for 
the  sick  man,  but  he  gave  small  en 
couragement.  He  had  consumption, 
although  he  might  linger  long.  "  Who's 
going  to  take  care  of  the  poor  fel 
low,  I  don't  know,"  said  the  doc 
tor. 

"I  be,"  said  Dick. 

"Then  there  are  the  children,"  said 
the  doctor. 

96 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

"One  of  'em  is  mine,  and  I'll 
care  of  his,"  said  Dick. 

The  doctor  stared,  as  one  stares  who 
sees  a  good  deed  in  a  naughty  world, 
with  a  mixture  of  awe,  of  contempt,  and 
of  incredulity. 

"  Well,"  he  said,  "it's  lucky  you  came 
along." 

After  that  Dick  simply  continued 
in  his  new  path  of  life.  He  worked 
and  nursed.  It  was  inconceivable  how 
much  the  man  accomplished.  He  de 
veloped  an  enormous  capacity  for  work. 
In  the  autumn  he  painted  the  house; 
the  cellar  was  full  of  winter  vegetables, 
the  wood-pile  was  compact.  The  chil 
dren  were  warmly  clad,  and  Lottie  went 
to  school.  Her  father  had  bought  an 
old  horse  for  a  song,  and  he  carried  her 
to  school  every  day.  Once  in  January 
he  had  occasion  to  drive  around  the 
97 


SIX    TREES 

other  side  of  the  mountain  which  he 
had  climbed  the  night  of  his  return. 
He  started  early  in  the  afternoon,  that 
he  might  be  in  season  to  go  for  Lottie. 

It  was  a  clear,  cold  day.  Snow  was 
on  the  ground,  a  deep,  glittering  level, 
with  a  hard  crust  of  ice.  The  sleigh  slid 
over  the  frozen  surface  with  long  hiss 
es.  The  trees  were  all  bare  and  had 
suffered  frightfully  in  the  last  storm. 
The  rain  had  frozen  as  it  fell,  and  there 
had  been  a  high  gale.  The  ice-mailed 
branches  had  snapped,  and  sometimes 
whole  trees.  Dick,  slipping  along  on 
the  white  line  of  road  below,  gazed  up 
at  the  side  of  the  mountain.  He  looked 
and  looked  again.  Then  he  desisted. 
He  reached  over  and  cut  the  horse's 
back  with  the  reins.  "Get  up!"  he 
cried,  harshly. 

The  great  pine  had  fallen  from  his 
98 


THE    GREAT    PINE 

high  estate.  He  was  no  more  to  be 
seen  dominating  the  other  trees,  stand 
ing  out  in  solitary  majesty  among  his 
kind.  The  storm  had  killed  him.  He 
lay  prostrate  on  the  mountain. 

And  the  man  on  the  road  below 
passed  like  the  wind,  and  left  the  moun 
tain  and  the  dead  tree  behind. 


TbfieBaham  Tif 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 


>ARTHA  ELDER  had 
lived  alone  for  years  on 
Amesboro  road,  a  mile 
from  the  nearest  neigh 
bor,  three  miles  from  the 
village.  She  lived  in  the  low  cottage 
which  her  grandfather  had  built.  It\ 
was  painted  white,  and  there  was  a  4 
green  trellis  over  the  front  door  shaded] 
by  a  beautiful  rose- vine.  Martha  had 
very  little  money,  but  somehow  she  al 
ways  managed  to  keep  her  house  in 
good  order,  though  she  had  never  had_ 
any  blinds.  It  had  always  been  the 
dream  of  Martha's  life  to  have  blinds; 
103 


SIX    TREES 

her  mild  blue  eyes  were  very  sensitive 
to  the  glare  of  strong  sunlight,  and 
the  house  faced  west.  Sometimes  of  a 
summer  afternoon  Martha  waxed  fairly 
rebellious  because  of  her  lack  of  green 
blinds  to  soften  the  ardent  glare.  She 
had  green  curtains,  but  they  flapped  in 
the  wind  and  made  her  nervous,  and 
she  could  not  have  them  drawn. 

Blinds  were  not  the  only  things  which 
aroused  in  Martha  Elder  a  no  less  strong, 
though  unexpressed,  spirit  of  rebellion 
against  the  smallness  of  her  dole  of  the 
good  things  of  life.  Nobody  had  ever 
heard  this  tall,  fair,  gentle  woman  ut 
ter  one  word  of  complaint.  She  spoke 
and  moved  with  mild  grace.  The 
sweetest  acquiescence  seemed  evident 
in  her  every  attitude  of  body  and  tone 
of  voice.  People  said  that  Martha 
Elder  was  an  old  maid,  that  she  was  all 
104 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

alone  in  the  world,  that  she  had  a  hard 
time  to  get  along  and  keep  out  of  the 
poor-house,  but  that  she  was  perfectly 
contented  and  happy.  But  people  did 
not  know;  she  had  her  closets  of  pas- \ 
sionate  solitude  to  which  they  did  not ) 
penetrate.  When  her  sister  Adeline,  ten( 
years  after  her  father's  death,  had  mar 
ried  the  man  who  everybody  had  thought 
would  marry  Martha,  she  had  made  a 
pretty  wedding  for  her,  and  people  had 
said  Martha  did  not  care,  after  all ;  that 
she  was  cut  out  for  an  old  maid;  that 
she  did  not  want  to  marry.  Nobody 
knew,  not  her  sister,  not  even  the  man 
himself,  who  had  really  given  her  reason 
to  blame  him,  how  she  felt.  She  was 
encased  in  an  armor  of  womanly  pride 
as  impenetrable  as  a  coat  of  mail ;  it  was 
proof  against  everything  except  the  ar 
rows  of  agony  of  her  own  secret  longings. 
?  105 


SIX    TREES 

Martha  had  been  a  very  pretty  girl, 
much  prettier  than  her  younger  sister 
Adeline ;  it  was  strange  that  she  had  not 
been  preferred ;  it  was  strange  that  she 
had  not  had  suitors  in  plenty ;  but  there 
may  have  been  something  about  the 
very  fineness  of  her  femininity  and  its 
perfection  which  made  it  repellent^ 
Adeline,  with  her  coarse  bloom  and 
loud  laugh  and  ready  stare,  had  al 
ways  had  admirers  by  the  score,  while 
Martha,  who  was  really  exquisite,  used 
to  go  to  bed  and  lie  awake  listening  to 
the  murmur  of  voices  under  the  green 
trellis  of  the  front  door,  until  the  man 
who  married  her  sister  came.  Then 
for  a  brief  space  his  affections  did 
verge  towards  Martha ;  he  said  various 
things  to  her  in  a  voice  whose  cadences 
ever  after  made  her  music  of  life;  he 
looked  at  her  with  an  expression  which 
106 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

became  photographed,  as  by  some  law 
of  love  instead  of  light,  on  her  heart. 
Then  Adeline,  exuberant  with  passion, 
incredulous  that  he  could  turn  to  her 
sister  instead  of  herself,  won  him  away 
by  her  strong  pull  upon  the  earthy  part  \ 
of  him.  Martha  had  not  dreamed  of 
contesting  the  matter,  of  making  a  fight 
for  the  man  whom  she  loved.  She  yield 
ed  at  once  with  her  pride  so  exquisite  ' 

T— * 

that  it  seemed  like  meekness. 

When  Adeline  went  away,  she  settled 
down  at  once  into  her  solitary  old- 
maiden  estate,  although  she  was  still  / 

(   comparatively  young.   T3KeTiad  her  lit- 
tle  ancestral  house,  her  small  vegeta- 

'  ble  garden,  a  tiny  wood-lot  from  which 
she  hired  enough  wood  cut  to  supply-- 
her   needs,  and   a   very   small   sum  of    \ 
money  in  the  bank,  enough  to  pay  her 
taxes   and   insurance,    and   not   much 
107 


SIX    TREES 

She  had  a  few  hens,  and  lived 
mostly  on  eggs  and  vegetables;  as  for 
her  clothes,  she  never  wore  them  out; 
she  moved  about  softly  and  carefully, 
and  never  frayed  the  hems  of  her  gowns, 
nor  rubbed  her  elbows;  and  as  for  soil, 
no  mortal  had  ever  seen  a  speck  of 
grime  upon  Martha  Elder  or  her  rai 
ment.  She  seemed  to  pick  her  spotless 
way  through  life  like  a  white  dove. 
There  was  a  story  that  Martha  once 
wore  a  white  dress  all  one  summer, 
keeping  it  immaculate  without  washing, 
and  it  seemed  quite  possible.  When 
she  walked  abroad  she  held  her  dress 
skirt  at  an  unvarying  height  of  modest 
neatness  revealing  snowy  starched  pet 
ticoats  and  delicate  ankles  in  white 
stockings.  She  might  have  been  paint 
ed  as  a  type  of  elderly  maiden  peace 
and  pure  serenity  by  an  artist  who 
108 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

could  see  only  externals.  But  it  was 
very  different  with  her  from  what 
people  thought.  Nobody  dreamed  of 
the  fierce  tension  of  her  nerves  as  she 
sat  at  her  window  sewing  through  the 
long  summer  afternoons,  drawing  her 
monotonous  thread  in  and  out  of  dain 
ty  seamsj  nobody  dreamed  what  revolt 
that  little  cottage  roof,  when  it  was 
covered  with  wintry  snows,  sometimes 
sheltered.  When  Martha's  sister  came 
home  with  her  husband  and  beau 
tiful  first  baby  to  visit  her,  her 
smiling  calm  of  welcome  was  inimita 
ble. 

"  Martha  never  did  say  much,"  Ade 
line  told  her  husband,  when  they  were 
in  their  room  at  night.  "She  didn't 
exclaim  even  over  the  baby."  As  she 
spoke  she  looked  gloatingly  at  his  rosy 
curves  as  he  lay  asleep.  "  Martha's  an 
109 


SIX    TREES 

old  maid  if  there  ever  was  one,"  she 
added. 

"It's  queer,  for  she's  pretty,"  said 
her  husband. 

"I  don't  call  her  pretty,"  said  Ade 
line  ;  "  not  a  mite  of  color."  She  glanced 
at  her  high  bloom  and  tossing  black 
mane  of  hair  in  the  mirror. 

"Yes,  that's  so,"  agreed  Adeline's 
husband.  Still,  sometimes  he  used  to 
look  at  Martha  with  the  old  expression, 
unconsciously,  even  before  his  wife, 
but  Martha  never  recognized  it  for 

r~ — . \__         -*••- 

same.]  When  he  had  married  her  sis 
ter  he  had  established  between  him 
self  and  her  such  a  veil  of  principle 
that  her  eyes  never  after  could  catch 
the  true  meaning  of  him.  Yet/ nobody 
knew  how  glad  she  was  when  this  little 
family  outside  her  pale  of  life  had  gone, 
and  she  could  settle  back  unmolested 
no 


"'SHE  DIDN'T  EXCLAIM  EVEN  OVER  THE  BABY'" 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

into  her  own  tracks,  which  were  ap 
parently  those  of  peace,  but  in  reality 
those  of  a  caged  panther.  There  was  a 
strip  of  carpet  worn  threadbare  in  the 
sitting-room  by  Martha's  pacing  up 
and  down^y  At  last  she  had  to  take  out 
that  breadth  and  place  it  next  the  wall, 
and  replace  it. 

People  wondered  why,  with  all  Mar 
tha's  sweetness  and  serenity,  she  had 
not  professed  religion  and  united  with 
the  church.  When  the  minister  came 
to  talk  with  her  about  it  he  was  non 
plussed.  She  said,  with  an  innocent 
readiness  which  abashed  him,  that  she 
believed  in  the  Christian  religion,  and 
trusted  that  she  loved  God ;  then  it  was 
as  if  she  folded  wings  of  concealment 
over  her  maiden  character,  and  he 
could  see  no  more. 

It  was  at  last  another  woman  to 
in 


SIX    TREES 

whom  she  unbosomed  herself,  and  she 
was  a  safe  confidante;  no  safer  could 
have  been  chosen.  She  was  a  far- 
removed  cousin,  and  stone-deaf  from 
scarlet  fever  when  she  was  a  baby. 
She  was  a  woman  older  than  Martha  ,7 
and  had  come  to  make  her  a  visit.  She 
lived  with  a  married  sister,  to  whom  she 
was  a  burden,  and  who  was  glad  to  be 
rid  of  her  for  a  few  weeks.  She  could 
not  hear  one  word  that  was  spoken  to 
her ;  she  could  only  distinguish  language 
uncertainly  from  the  motion  of  the  lips. 
She  was  absolutely  penniless,  except  for 
a  little  which  she  earned  by  knitting 
cotton  lace.  To  this  woman  Martha 
laid  bare  her  soul  the  day  before 
Christmas,  as  the  two  sat  by  the  western 
windows,  one  knitting,  the  other  darn 
ing  a  pair  of  white  stockings. 

''To-morrow's   Christmas,"   said  the 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

deaf  woman,  suddenly, -in  her  strange, 
unmodulated  voice.  She  had  a  flat, 
,  pale  face,  with  smooth  loops  of  blond 
hair  around  the  temples. 

Martha  said,  ''It  ain't  much  Christ 
mas  to  me." 

"What?"  returned  the  deaf  woman. 

"It  ain't  much  Christmas  to  me," 
repeated  Martha.  She  did  not  raise 
her  voice  in  the  least,  and  she  moved 


her  lips  very  little.  Speech  never 
•  turbed  the  sweet  serenity  of  her  mouth . 
The  deaf  woman  did  not  catch  a  word, 
but  i$Ee~  was  always  sensitive  about 
asking  over  for  the  second  time.  She 
knitted  and  acted  as  if  she  under 
stood. 

"No,  it  ain't  much  Christmas  to  me, 

and  it  never  has  been,"  said  Martha. 

"  I  'ain't  never  felt  as  if  I  had  had  any 

Christmas,  for  my  part.     I  don't  know 

113 


SIX    TREES 

where  it  has  come  in  if  I  have.  I  never 
had  a  Christmas  present  in  my  whole\ 
life,  unless  I  count  in  that  purple  cro 
cheted  shawl  that  Adeline  gave  me,  that 
somebody  gave  her,  and  she  couldn't 
wear,  because  it  wasn't  becomin'.  I 
never  thought  much  of  it  myself.  Pur 
ple  never  suited  me,  either.  That  was 
the  only  Christmas  present  I  ever  had. 
That  came  a  week  after  Christmas,  ten 
year  ago,  and  I  suppose  I  might  count 
that  in.  I  kept  it  laid  away,  and  the 
moths  got  into  it. " 

^What?"  said  the  deaf  woman. 

"  The  moths  got  into  it,"  said  Martha] 

The  deaf  woman  nodded  wisely  and 
knitted. 

"Christmas!"    said   Martha,   with   a 

scorn   at   once    pathetic   and   bitter — 

"talk    about    Christmas!        What    is 

Christmas  to  a  woman  all  alone  in  the 

114 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

world  as  I  am?  If  you  want  to  see  the 
loneliest  thing  in  all  creation,  look  at 
a  woman  all  alone  in  the  world.  Ade 
line  is  twenty  -  five  miles  away,  and 
she's  got  her  family.  I'm  all  alone.  I 
might  as  well  be  at  the  north  pole. 
What's  Christmas  to  a  woman  without 
children,  or  any  other  women  to  think 
about,  livin'  with  her?  If  I  had  any 
money  to  give  it  might  be  different.  I 
might  find  folks  to  give  to  —  other 
f oiks' s  children ;  but  I  'ain't  got  any  mon 
ey.  I've  got  nothing^ j  I  can't  give  any 
Christmas  presents  myself,  and  I  can't 
have  any.  Lord!  Talk  about  Christ 
mas  to  me !  I  can't  help  if  I  am  wicked. 
I'm  sick  and  tired  of  livin'.  I  have 
been  for  some  time."  Just  then  a  farm 
er's  team  loaded  with  evergreens  sur 
mounted  with  merry  boys  went  by,  and 
she  pointed  tragically;  and  the  deaf 


SIX    TREES 

woman's  eyes  followed  her  pointing 
finger,  and  suddenly  her  great,  smiling 
face  changed.  "There  they  go  with 
Christmas-trees  for  other  women," 
said  Martha;  "for  women  who  have 
got  what  I  haven't.  I  never  had  a 
Christmas-tree.  I  never  had  a  Christ 
mas.  The  Lord  never  gave  me  one.  I 
want  one  Christmas  before  I  die.  I've 
got  a  right  to  it.  I  want  one  Christmas-^ 
tree  and  one  Christmas."  Her  voice 
rose  to  daring  impetus ;  the  deaf  woman 
looked  at  her  curiously. 

What?"'  said  she. 

"  I  want  one  Christmas,"  said  Martha. 
Still  the  deaf  woman  did  not  hear,  but 
suddenly  the  calm  of  her  face  broke  up ; 
she  began  to  weep.  It  was  as  if  she 
understood  the  other's  mood  by  some 
subtler  faculty  than  that  of  hearing. 
"  Christmas  is  a  pretty  sad  day  to  me," 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

said  she,  "  ever  since  poor  mother  died. 
I  always  realize  more  than  any  other 
time  how  alone  I  be,  and  how  my  room 
would  be  better  than  my  company, 
and  I  don't  ever  have  any  presents. 
And  I  can't  give  any.  I  give  all  my 
knittin'  money  to  Jane  for  my  board, 
and  that  ain't  near  enough.  Oh,  Lord! 
it's  a  hard  world!" 

"I  want  one  Christmas,  and  one 
Christmas-tree,"  said  Martha,  in  a  singu 
lar  tone,  almost  as  if  she  were  demand 
ing  it  of  some  unseen  power. 

"What?"  said  the  deaf  woman. 

"I  want  one  Christmas,  and  one 
Christmas-tree,"  repeated  Martha. 

The  deaf  woman  nodded  and  knit 
ted,  after  wiping  her  eyes.  Her  face 
was  still  quivering  with  repressed  emo 
tion. 


Martha  rose.     "Well,  there's  no  use 
117 


SIX    TREES 

talkin',"  said  she,  in  a  hard  voice; 
''folks  can  take  what  they  get  in  this 
world,  not  what  they  want,  I  s'pose." 
Her  face  softened  a  little  as  she  looked 
at  the  deaf  woman.  "  I  guess  I'll  make 
some  toast  for  supper;  there's  enough 
milk,"  said  she. 

"  What?"  said  the  deaf  woman. 

Martha  put  her  lips  close  to  her  ear, 
and  shouted,  "I  guess  I'll  make  some 
toast  for  supper."  The  deaf  woman 
caught  the  word  toast,  and  smiled 
happily,  with  a  sniff  of  retreating  grief  p 
she  was  very  fond  of  toast.  "Jane 
'most  never  has  it,"  said  she.  As  she 
sat  there  beside  the  window,  she  pres 
ently  smelled  the  odor  of  toast  coming 
in  from  the  kitchen;  then  it  began  to 
snow.  The  snow  fell  in  great,  dampy 
blobs,  coating  all  the  trees  thickly. 
When  Martha  entered  the  sitting-room 
118 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

to  get  a  dish  from  the  china-closet]  the 
deaf  woman  pointed,  and  said  it  was 
snowing. 

"Yes,  I  see  it  is,"  replied  Martha. 
"Well,  it  can  snow,  for  all  me.  I  'ain't 
got  any  Christmas-tree  to  go  to  to 
night." 

As  she  spoke,  both  she  and  the  deaf 
woman,  looking  out  of  the  window, 
noted  the  splendid  fir  -  balsam  op 
posite,  and  at  the  same  time  a  man 
with  an  axe,  preparing  to  cut  it 
down. 

"Why,  that  man's  goin'  to  cut  down 
that  tree!  Ain't  it  on  your  land?" 
cried  the  deaf  woman. 

Martha  shrieked  and  ran  out  of  the 
house,  bareheaded  in  the  dense  fall  of 
snow.  She  caught  hold  of  the  man's 
arm,  and  he  turned  and  looked  at  her 
with  a  sort  of  stolid  surprise',  fast" 
no 


SIX    TREES 

strengthening  into  obstinacy!  "What 
you  cuttin'  down  this  tree  for?"  asked 
Martha. 

The  man  muttered  that  he  had  been 
sent  for  one  for  Lawyer  Ede. 

"Well,  you  can't  have  mine,"  said 
Martha.  "This  ain't  Lawyer  Ede's 
land.  His  is  on  the  other  side  of  the 
fence.  There  are  trees  plenty  good 
enough  over  there.  You  let  mine  be." 

The  man's  arm  which  held  the  axe 
twitched.  Suddenly  Martha  snatched 
it  away  by  such  an  unexpected  motion 
that  he  yielded.  Then  she  was  mis 
tress  of  the  situation.  She  stood  be 
fore  the  tree,  brandishing  the  axe.  "  If 
you  dare  to  come  one  step  nearer 
my  tree,  I'll  kill  you,"  said  she.  The 
—man  paled.  He  was  a  stolid  farmer, 
unused  to  women  like  her,  or,  rather, 
unused  to  such  developments  in  wom- 

120 


THERE  ARE  TREES  PLENTY  GOOD  ENOUGH  OVER  THERE 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

en  like  her.  "Give  me  that  axe,"  he 
said. 

"I'll  give  you  that  axe  if  you  prom 
ise  to  cut  down  one  of  Lawyer  Ede's 
trees,  and  let  mine  be!" 

"  All  right, "  assented  the  man,  sulkily. 

"You  go  over  the  wall,  then,  and  I'll 
hand  you  the  axe." 

The  man,  with  a  shuffling  of  reluc 
tant  yielding,  approached  the  wall  and 
climbed  over.  Then  Martha  yielded  up 
the  axe.  Then  she  stationed  herself  in 
front  of  her  tree,  to  make  sure  that  it 
was  not  harmed.  The  snow  fell  thick 
and  fast  on  her  uncovered  head,  but  she 
did  not  mind.  She  remembered  how 
once  the  man  who  had  married  her 
sister  had  said  something  to  her  beside 
this  tree,  when  it  was  young  like  her 
self.  She  remembered  long  summer 
afternoons  of  her  youth  looking  out 

8  121 


SIX    TREES 

upon  it.  J^Her  old  dreams  and  hopes 
of  youth  seemed  still  abiding  beneath 
it,  greeting  her  like  old  friends.  She 
felt  that  she  would  have  been  killed 
herself  rather  than  have  the  tree  harm 
ed.  The  soothing  fragrance  of  it  came 
in  her  face.  She  felt  suddenly  as  if 
the  tree  were  alive.  A  great,  protect 
ing  tenderness  for  it  came  over  her. 
She  began  to  hear  axe  strokes  on  the_J 
other  side  of  the  wall.  Then  the  deaf 
woman  came  to  the  door  of  the  house, 
and  stood  there  staring  at  her  through 
the  damp  veil  of  snow.  "  You'll  get 
your  death  out  there,  Marthy,"  she 
called  out. 

"  No,  I  won't,"  replied  Martha,  know 
ing  as  she  spoke  that  she  was  not 
heard. 

"What    be    you    stayin'    out    there^ 
for?"  called    the    deaf   woman,   in   an 

122 


i 

I 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

alarmed  voice.  Martha  made  no  re 
ply. 

Presently  the  woman  came  out 
through  the  snow;  she  paused  before 
she  reached  her;  it  was  quite  evident 
what  she  feared  even  before  she  spoke. 
"Be  you  crazy?"  asked  she. 

4  Tin  going  to  see  to  it  that  John 
Page  don't  cut  down  this  tree,"  re 
plied  Martha.  "I  know  how  set  the 
Pages  are."  The  deaf  woman  stared 
helplessly  at  her,  not  hearing  a  word. 

Then  John  Page  came  to  the  wall. 

Look  at  here,"  he  called  out.  "I 
ain't  goin'  to  tech  your  tree.  I  thought 
it  was  on  Ede's  land.  I'm  cuttin' 
down  another." 

"You  mind  you  don't,"   responded 

Martha,  and  she  hardly  knew  her  voice. 

When  John  Page  went  home  that  night 

he  told  his  wife  that  he'd  "  never  known 

123 


SIX    TREES 

that  Martha  Elder  was  such  an  up  and 
comin'  woman.  Deliver  me  from  deal- 
in'  with  old  maids,"  said  he;  "they're 
worse  than  barbed  wire." 

•vto 

The  snow  continued  until  midnight, 
then  the  rain  set  in,  then  it  cleared  and 
froze.  When  the  sun  rose  next  morning 
everything  was  coated  with  ice.  The 
fir-balsam  was  transfigured,  wonderful. 
Every  little  twig  glittered  as  with  the 
glitter  of  precious  stones,  the  branches 
spread  low  in  rainbow  radiances.  Mar 
tha  and  the  deaf  woman  stood  at  the 
sitting-room  window  looking  out  at  it. 
Martha's  face  changed  as  she  looked. 
She  put  her  face  close  to  the  other 
woman's  ear  and  shouted:  "Look  here, 
Abby,  you  ain't  any  too  happy  with 
Jane ;  you  stay  here  with  me  this  winter. 
I'm  lonesome,  and  we'll  get  along  some 
how."  The  deaf  woman  heard  her,  and 
124 


STOOD    STARING    AT    THE    GLORIFIED    FIR-BALSAM 


fcfc 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

a  great  light  came  into  her  flat  counte 
nance.  ^ 

"Stay  with  you?" 

Martha  nodded. 

"I  earn  enough  to  pay  for  the  flour 
and  sugar,"  said  she,  eagerly,  "and 
you've  got  vegetables  in  the  cellar,  and 
I  don't  want  another  thing  to  eat,  and 
I'll  do  all  the  work  if  you'll  let  me, 
Marthy." 

"I'll  be  glad  to  have  you  stay,"  said 
Martha,  with  the  eagerness  of  one  who 
ps  at  a  treasure. 

Do  you  mean  you  want  me  to 
stay?"  asked  the  deaf  woman,  wist 
fully,  still  fearing  that  she  had  not 
heard  aright.  Martha  nodded. 

"I'll  go  out  in  the  kitchen  and  make 
some  of  them  biscuit  I  used  to  make 
for  breakfast,"  said  the  deaf  woman. 
"  God  bless  you,  Marthy !" 
125 


gras 
"3 


SIX    TREES 

Martha  stood  staring  at  the  glorified 
fir-balsam.  All  at  once  it  seemed  to  her 
that  she  saw  herself,  as  she  was  in  her 
youth,  under  it.  Old  possessions  filled 
her  soul  with  rapture,  and  the  convic 
tion  of  her  inalienable  birthright  of  the 
happiness  of  life  was  upon  her.  She 
also  seemed  to  see  all  the  joys  which 
she  had  possessed  or  longed  for  in  the 
radius  of  its  radiance ;  its  boughs  seem 
ed  overladen  with  fulfilment  and  prom 
ise,  and  a  truth  came  to  her  for  the 
great  Christmas  present  of  her  life.  She 
became  sure  that  whatever  happiness 
God  gives  He  never  retakes,  and,  more 
over,  that  He  holds  ready  the  food  for 
all  longing,  that  one  cannot  exist  with 
out  the  other. 

"  Whatever  I've  ever  had  that  I  loved 
I've  got,"  said  Martha  Elder,  "and 
whatever  I've  wanted  I'm  goin'  to 
126 


THE    BALSAM    FIR 

have.'jj  Then  she  turned  around  and 
went  out  in  the  kitchen  to  help  about 
breakfast,  and  the  dazzle  of  the  Christ 
mas-tree  was  so  great  in  her  eyes  that 
she  was  almost  blinded  to  all  the  sordid 
conditions  of  her  daily  life. 


THE 
LOMBARDY  POPLAR 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 


•HERE  had  been  five  in 
the  family  of  the  Lom- 
bardy  poplar.  Formerly 
he  had  stood  before  the 
Dunn  house  in  a  lusty 
row  of  three  brothers  and  a  mighty 
father,  from  whose  strong  roots,  extend 
ing  far  under  the  soil,  they  had  all 
sprung. 

Now  they  were  all  gone,  except  this 
one,  the  last  of  the  sons  of  the  tree.  He 
alone  remained,  faithful  as  a  sentinel 
before  the  onslaught  of  winter  storms 
and  summer  suns ;  he  yielded  to  neither. 
He  was  head  and  shoulders  above  the 
13* 


SIX    TREES 

other  trees  —  the  cherry  and  horse- 
chestnuts  in  the  square  front  yard  be 
hind  him.  Higher  than  the  house, 
piercing  the  blue  with  his  broad  trun 
cate  of  green,  he  stood  silent,  stiff, 
and  immovable.  He  seldom  made  any 
sound  with  his  closely  massed  foliage, 
and  it  required  a  mighty  and  concen 
trated  gust  of  wind  to  sway  him  ever  so 
little  from  his  straight  perpendicular. 

As  the  tree  was  the  last  of  his  imme 
diate  family,  so  the  woman  who  lived 
in  the  house  was  the  last  of  hers.  Sarah 
Dunn  was  the  only  survivor  of  a  large 
family.  No  fewer  than  nine  children  had 
been  born  to  her  parents;  now  father, 
mother,  and  eight  children  were  all  dead, 
and  this  elderly  woman  was  left  alone  in 
the  old  house.  Consumption  had  been 
in  the  Dunn  family.  The  last  who  had 
succumbed  to  it  was  Sarah's  twin-sis- 
132 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

ter  Marah,  and  she  had  lived  until  both 
had  gray  hair. 

After  that  last  funeral,  where  she  was 
the  solitary  real  mourner,  there  being 
only  distant  relatives  of  the  Dunn  name, 
Sarah  closed  all  the  house  except  a  few 
rooms,  and  resigned  herself  to  living 
out  her  colorless  life  alone.  She  sel 
dom  went  into  any  other  house ;  she  had 
few  visitors,  with  the  exception  of  one 
woman.  She  was  a  second  cousin,  of 
the  same  name,  being  also  Sarah  Dunn. 
She  came  regularly  on  Thursday  after 
noons,  stayed  to  tea,  and  went  to  the 
evening  prayer  -  meeting.  Besides  the 

w        tt/ 

sameness  of  name,  there  was  a  remark-       /  jr 
able  resemblance  in  personal  appear- •j/r-" 
ance  between  the  two  women.     They 
were  of  about  the  same  age ;  they  both 
had  gray -blond  hair,  which  was  very 
thin,  and  strained  painfully  back  from 


SIX    TREES 

their  ears  and  necks  into  tiny  rosettes 
at  the  backs  of  their  heads,  below  little, 
black  lace  caps  trimmed  with  bows  of 
purple  ribbon.  The  cousin  Sarah  had 
not  worn  the  black  lace  cap  until  the 
other  Sarah's  twin -sister  Marah  had 
died.  Then  all  the  dead  woman's  ward 
robe  had  been  given  to  her,  since  she  was 
needy.  Sarah  and  her  twin  had  always 
dressed  alike,  and  there  were  many  in 
the  village  who  never  until  the  day  of 
her  death  had  been  able  to  distinguish 
Marah  from  Sarah.  They  were  alike 
not  only  in  appearance,  but  in  character. 
The  resemblance  was  so  absolute  as  to 
produce  a  feeling  of  something  at  fault 
in  the  beholder.  It  was  difficult,  when 
looking  from  one  to  the  other,  to  be 
lieve  that  the  second  was  a  vital  fact ;  it 
was  like  seeing  double.  After  Marah 
was  dead  it  was  the  same  with  the 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

cousin,  Sarah  Dunn.  The  clothes  of 
the  deceased  twin  completed  all  that 
had  been  necessary  to  make  the  re 
semblance  perfect.  There  was  in  the 
whole  Dunn  family  a  curious  endurance 
of  characteristics.  It  was  said  in  the 
village  that  you  could  tell  a  Dunn  if  you 
met  him  at  the  ends  of  the  earth.  They 
were  all  described  as  little,  and  slop 
ing-shouldered,  and  peak-chinned,  and 
sharp-nosed,  and  light-livered.  Sarah 
and  Cousin  Sarah  were  all  these.  The 
family  tricks  of  color  and  form  and 
feature  were  represented  to  their  fullest 
extent  in  both.  People  said  that  they 
were  Dunns  from  the  soles  of  their  feet 
to  the  crowns  of  their  heads.  They  did 
not  even  use  plurals  in  dealing  with 
them.  When  they  set  out  together  for 
evening  meeting  in  the  summer  twilight, 
both  moving  with  the  same  gentle,  mine- 


SIX    TREES 

ing  step,  the  same  slight  sway  of 
shoulders,  draped  precisely  alike  with 
little,  knitted,  white  wool  shawls,  the 
same  deprecating  cant  of  heads,  identi 
cally  bonneted,  as  if  they  were  per 
petually  avoiding  some  low -hanging 
bough  of  life  in  their  way  of  progress, 
the  neighbors  said,  "  There's  Sarah  Dunn 
Vgoin'  to  meetin'." 

When  the  twin  was  alive  it  was, 
"There's  Sarah  and  Marah  goin'  to 
meetin'."  Even  the  very  similar  names 
had  served  as  a  slight  distinction,  as 
formerly  the  different  dress  of  the  cous 
ins  had  made  it  easier  to  distinguish 
between  them.  Now  there  was  no 
difference  between  the  outward  charac 
teristics  of  the  two  Sarah  Dunns,  even 
to  a  close  observer.  Name,  appear 
ance,  dress,  all  were  identical.  And  the 
minds  of  the  two  seemed  to  partake  of 

136 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

this  similarity.  Their  conversation  con 
sisted  mainly  of  a  peaceful  monotony 
of  agreement.  "For  the  Lord's  sake, 
Sarah  Dunn,  'ain't  you  got  any  mind 
of  your  own?"  cried  a  neighbor  of  an 
energetic  and  independent  turn,  once 
when  she  had  run  in  of  a  Thursday 
afternoon  when  the  cousin  was  there. 
Sarah  looked  at  the  cousin  before  reply 
ing,  and  the  two  minds  seemed  to  cogi 
tate  the  problem  through  the  medium 
of  mild,  pale  eyes,  set  alike  under  faint 
levels  of  eyebrow.  "For  the  Lord's 
sake,  if  you  ain't  lookin'  at  each  other 
to  find  out!"  cried  the  neighbor,  with  a 
high  sniff,  while  the  two  other  women 
stared  at  each  other  in  a  vain  effort 
to  understand. 

The  twin  had  been  dead  five  years, 
and  the  cousin  had  come  every  Thurs 
day  afternoon  to  see  Sarah  before  any 


SIX    TREES 

point  of  difference  in  their  mental  atti 
tudes  was  evident.  They  regarded  the 
weather  with  identical  emotions,  they 
relished  the  same  food,  they  felt  the 
same  degree  of  heat  or  cold,  they  had 
the  same  likes  and  dislikes  for  other 
people,  but  at  last  there  came  a  dis 
agreement.  It  was  on  a  Thursday  in 
summer,  when  the  heat  was  intense. 
The  cousin  had  come  along  the  dusty 
road  between  the  white-powdered  weeds 
and  flowers,  holding  above  her  head 
an  umbrella  small  and  ancient,  covered 
with  faded  green  silk,  which  had  be 
longed  to  Marah,  wearing  an  old  purple 
muslin  of  the  dead  woman's,  and  her 
black  lace  mitts.  Sarah  was  at  home, 
rocking  in  the  south  parlor  window, 
dressed  in  the  mate  to  the  purple 
muslin,  fanning  herself  with  a  small 
black  fan  edged  with  feathers  which 
138 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

gave  out  a    curious   odor   of    mouldy 
roses. 

When  the  cousin  entered,  she  laid 
aside  her  bonnet  and  mitts,  and  seated 
herself  opposite  Sarah,  and  fanned  her 
self  with  the  mate  to  the  fan. 

"It  is  dreadful  warm,"  said  the 
cousin. 

"Dreadful!"  said  Sarah. 

"  Seems  to  me  it  'ain't  been  so  warm 
since  that  hot  Sabbath  the  summer 
after  Marah  died,"  said  the  cousin,  with 
gentle  reminiscence. 

"Just  what  I  was  thinking,"  said 
Sarah. 

"An'  it's  dusty,  too,  just  as  it  was 
then." 

"  Yes,  it  was  dreadful  dusty  then.     I 
got  my  black  silk  so  full  of  dust  it  was 
just  about  ruined,  goin'  to  meetin'  that 
Sabbath,"  said  Sarah. 
9 


SIX    TREES 

"  An'  I  was  dreadful  afraid  I  had  sp'ilt 
Marah's,  an'  she  always  kept  it  so  nice." 

"Yes,  she  had  always  kept  it  dread 
ful  nice,"  assented  Sarah. 

"  Yes,  she  had.  I  'most  wished,  when 
I  got  home  that  afternoon,  and  saw 
how  dusty  it  was,  that  she'd  kept  it  and 
been  laid  away  in  it,  instead  of  my  hav- 
in'  it,  but  I  knew  she'd  said  to  wear 
it,  and  get  the  good  of  it,  and  never 
mind." 

4 'Yes,  she  would." 

"And  I  got  the  dust  all  off  it  with  a 
piece  of  her  old  black  velvet  bunnit," 
said  the  cousin,  with  mild  deprecation. 

"That's  the  way  I  got  the  dust  off 
mine,  with  a  piece  of  my  old  black  vel 
vet  bunnit,"  said  Sarah. 

"It's  better  than  anything  else  to 
take  the  dust  off  black  silk." 

"Yes, 'tis." 

140 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

"I  saw  Mis'  Andrew  Dunn  as  I  was 
comin'  past,"  said  the  cousin. 

"I  saw  her  this  mornin'  down  to  the 
store , ' '  said  Sarah . 

"I  thought  she  looked  kind  of  pin- 
dlin',  and  she  coughed  some." 

"  She  did  when  I  saw  her.  I  thought 
she  looked  real  miserable.  Shouldn't 
wonder  if  she  was  goin  in  the  same  way 
as  the  others." 

1  'Just  what  I  think." 

"  It  was  funny  we  didn't  get  the  con 
sumption,  ain't  it,  when  all  our  folks 
died  with  it?" 

"Yes,  it  is  funny." 

"I  s'pose  we  wa'n't  the  kind  to." 

"Yes,  I  s'pose  so." 

Then  the  two  women  swayed  peace 
fully  back  and  forth  in  their  rocking- 
chairs,  and  fluttered  their  fans  gently 
before  their  calm  faces. 
141 


SIX    TREES 

"It  is  too  hot  to  sew  to-day,"  re 
marked  Sarah  Dunn. 

"Yes,  it  is,"  assented  her  cousin. 

"  I  thought  I  wouldn't  bake  biscuit  for 
supper,  long  as  it  was  so  dreadful  hot." 

"I  was  hopin'  you  wouldn't.  It's  too 
hot  for  hot  biscuit.  They  kind  of  go 
against  you." 

"That's  what  I  said.  Says  I,  now  I 
ain't  goin'  to  heat  up  the  house  bakin' 
hot  bread  to-night.  I  know  she  won't 
want  me  to." 

"No,  you  was  just  right.     I  don't." 

"Says  I,  I've  got  some  good  cold 
bread  and  butter,  and  blackberries  that 
I  bought  of  the  little  Whitcomb  boy 
this  mornin',  and  a  nice  custard -pie, 
and  two  kinds  of  cake  besides  cookies, 
and  I  guess  that  '11  do." 

"  That's  just  what  I  should  have  pick 
ed  out  for  supper." 
142 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

"  And  I  thought  we'd  have  it  early,  so 
as  to  get  it  cleared  away,  and  take  our 
time  walkin'  to  meetin',  it's  so  dreadful 
hot." 

"Yes,  it's  a  good  idea." 

"I  s'pose  there  won't  be  so  many  to 
meetin',  it's  so  hot,"  said  Sarah. 

"Yes,  I  s'pose  so." 

"  It's  queer  folks  can  stay  away  from 
meetin'  on  account  of  the  weather." 

"It  don't  mean  much  to  them  that 
do,"  said  the  cousin,  with  pious  rancor. 

"That's  so,"  said  Sarah.  "I  guess 
it  don't.  I  guess  it  ain't  the  comfort  to 
them  that  it  is  to  me.  I  guess  if  some 
of  them  had  lost  as  many  folks  as  I 
have  they'd  go  whether  'twas  hot  or 
cold." 

"I  guess  they  would.  They  don't 
know  much  about  it." 

Sarah  gazed  sadly  and  reflectively 
*43 


SIX    TREES 

out  of  the  window  at  the  deep  yard, 
with  its  front  gravel  walk  bordered 
with  wilting  pinks  and  sprawling  peo 
nies,  its  horse-chestnut  and  cherry  trees, 
and  its  solitary  Lombardy  poplar  set  in 
advance,  straight  and  stiff  as  a  sentinel 
of  summer.  "Speakin'  of  losin'  folks," 
she  said,  "you  'ain't  any  idea  what  a 
blessin'  that  popple-tree  out  there  has 
been  to  me,  especially  since  Marah 
died." 

Then,  for  the  first  time,  the  cousin 
stopped  waving  her  fan  in  unison,  and 
the  shadow  of  a  different  opinion  dark 
ened  her  face.  "That  popple -tree?" 
she  said,  with  harsh  inquiry. 

"Yes,  that  popple-tree."  Sarah  con 
tinued  gazing  at  the  tree,  standing  in 
majestic  isolation,  with  its  long  streak 
of  shadow  athwart  the  grass. 

The  cousin  looked,  too;  then  she 
144 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

turned  towards  Sarah  with  a  frown  of 
puzzled  dissent  verging  on  irritability 
and  scorn.  "That  popple-tree!  Land! 
how  you  do  talk ! ' '  said  she.  '  *  What  sort 
of  a  blessin'  can  an  old  tree  be  when  your 
folks  are  gone,  Sarah  Dunn?" 

Sarah  faced  her  with  stout  affirma 
tion:  "I've  seen  that  popple  there  ever 
since  I  can  remember,  and  it's  all  I've 
got  left  that's  anyways  alive,  and  it 
seems  like  my  own  folks,  and  I  can't 
help  it." 

The  cousin  sniffed  audibly.  She 
resumed  fanning  herself,  with  violent 
jerks.  "Well,"  said  she,  "if  you  can 
feel  as  if  an  old  popple-tree  made  up  to 
you,  in  any  fashion,  for  the  loss  of  your 
own  folks,  and  if  you  can  feel  as  if  it  was 
them,  all  I've  got  to  say  is,  I  can't." 

"I'm  thankful  I  gan,"  said  Sarah 
Dunn. 

US 


SIX    TREES 

"  Well,  I  can't.  It  seems  to  me  as  if 
it  was  almost  sacrilegious." 

"I  can't  help  how  it  seems  to  you." 
There  was  a  flush  of  nervous  indig 
nation  on  Sarah  Dunn's  pale,  flaccid 
cheeks;  her  voice  rang  sharp.  The  re 
semblance  between  the  two  faces,  which 
had  in  reality  been  more  marked  in  ex 
pression,  as  evincing  a  perfect  accord  of 
mental  action,  than  in  feature  even,  had 
almost  disappeared. 

11  An  old  popple-tree !"  said  the  cousin, 
with  a  fury  of  sarcasm.  "If  it  had  been 
any  other  tree  than  a  popple,  it  wouldn't 
strike  anybody  as  quite  so  bad.  I've 
always  thought  a  popple  was  about  the 
homeliest  tree  that  grows.  Much  as 
ever  as  it  does  grow.  It  just  stays,  stiff 
and  pointed,  as  if  it  was  goin'  to  make 
a  hole  in  the  sky;  don't  give  no  shade 
worth  anything;  don't  seem  to  have 
146 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

much  to  do  with  the  earth  and  folks, 
anyhow.  I  was  thankful  when  I  got 
mine  cut  down.  Them  three  that  was 
in  front  of  our  house  were  always  an 
eyesore  to  me,  and  I  talked  till  I  got 
father  to  cut  them  down.  I  always 
wondered  why  you  hung  on  to  this 
one  so." 

"I  wouldn't  have  that  popple-tree 
cut  down  for  a  hundred  dollars,"  de 
clared  Sarah  Dunn.  She  had  closed 
her  fan,  and  she  held  it  up  straight  like 
a  weapon. 

"My  land!  Well,  if  I  was  goin'  to 
make  such  a  fuss  over  a  tree  I'd  have 
taken  something  different  from  a  popple. 
I'd  have  taken  a  pretty  elm  or  a  maple. 
They  look  something  like  trees.  This 
don't  look  like  anything  on  earth  be 
sides  itself.  It  ain't  a  tree.  It's  a 
stick  tryin'  to  look  like  one." 
147 


y 


SIX    TREES 

"  That's  why  I  like  it,"  replied  Sarah 
Dunn,  with  a  high  lift  of  her  head.  She 
gave  a  look  of  sharp  resentment  at  her 
cousin.  Then  she  gazed  at  the  tree 
f  again,  and  l>er  whole  face  changed  in- 
*)  describabl;/.  She  seemed  like  another 
"/  person.  The  tree  seemed  to  cast  a 
shadow  of  likeness  over  her.  She  ap 
peared  straighter,  taller ;  all  her  lines  of 
meek  yielding,  or  scarcely  even  any 
thing  so  strong  as  yielding,  of  utter 
passiveness,  vanished.  She  looked  stiff 
and  uncompromising.  Her  mouth  was 
firm,  her  chin  high,  her  eyes  steady,  and, 
more  than  all,  there  was  over  her  an 
expression  of  individuality  which  had 
not  been  there  before.  "That's  why 
I  like  the  popple,"  said  she,  in  an  in 
cisive  voice.  "  That's  just  why.  I'm 
sick  of  things  and  folks  that  are  just 
like  everything  and  everybody  else. 
148 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

I'm  sick  of  trees  that  are  just  trees.     I 
like  one  that  ain't." 

"My  land!"  ejaculated  the  cousin,  in 
a  tone  of  contempt  not  unmixed  with 
timidity.  She  stared  at  the  other  wom 
an  with  shrinking  and  aversion  in  her 
pale-blue  eyes.  "What  has  come  over 
you,  Sarah  Dunn?"  said  she,  at  last, 
with  a  feeble  attempt  to  assert  her 
self. 

"Nothin'  has  come  over  me.  I  al 
ways  felt  that  way  about  that  popple." 

"Marah  wa'n't  such  a  fool  about  that 
old  popple." 

"No,  she  wa'n't,  but  maybe  she 
would  have  been  if  I  had  been  taken 
first  instead  of  her.  Everybody  has  got 
to  have  something  to  lean  on." 

"  Well,  I  'ain't  got  anything  any  more 
than    you   have,  but  I  can    stand  up 
straight  without  an  old  popple." 
149 


SIX    TREES 

"  You  'ain't  no  call  to  talk  that  way," 
said  Sarah. 

"  I  hate  to  hear  folks  that  I've  always 
thought  had  common  -  sense  talk  like 
fools,"  said  the  cousin,  with  growing 
courage. 

"If  you  don't  like  to  hear  me  talk, 
it's  always  easy  enough  to  get  out  of 
hearin'  distance." 

"I'd  like  to  know  what  you  mean  by 
that,  Sarah  Dunn." 

"  I  mean  it  just  as  you  want  to  take 
it." 

"  Maybe  you  mean  that  my  room  is 
better  than  my  company." 

"  Just  as  you  are  a  mind  to  take  it." 

The  cousin  sat  indeterminately  for  a 
few  minutes.  She  thought  of  the  bread 
and  the  blackberries,  the  pie  and  the  two 
kinds  of  cake. 

"What  on  earth  do  you  mean  goin' 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

on  so  queer?"  said  she,  in  a  hesitating 
and  somewhat  conciliatory  voice. 

"  I  mean  just  what  I  said.  That  tree 
is  a  blessin'  to  me,  it's  company,  and 
I  think  it's  the  handsomest  tree  any 
wheres  around.  That's  what  I  meant, 
and  if  you  want  to  take  me  up  for  it, 
you  can." 

The  cousin  hesitated.  She  further 
reflected  that  she  had  in  her  solitary 
house  no  bread  at  all;  she  had  not 
baked  for  two  days.  She  would  have 
to  make  a  fire  and  bake  biscuits  in  all 
that  burning  heat,  and  she  had  no  cake 
nor  berries.  In  fact,  there  was  nothing 
whatever  in  her  larder,  except  two  cold 
potatoes,  and  a  summer  -  squash  pie, 
which  she  suspected  was  sour.  She 
wanted  to  bury  the  hatchet,  she  wanted 
to  stay,  but  her  slow  blood  was  up.  All 
her  strength  of  character  lay  in  inertia. 


SIX    TREES 

One  inertia  of  acquiescence  was  over, 
the  other  of  dissent  was  triumphant. 
She  could  scarcely  yield  for  all  the 
bread  and  blackberries  and  cake.  She 
shut  up  her  fan  with  a  clap. 

"That  fan  was  Marah's,"  said  Sarah, 
meaningly,  with  a  glance  of  reproach 
and  indignation. 

"  I  know  it  was  Marah's/'  returned  the 
cousin,  rising  with  a  jerk.  "I  know 
it  was  Marah's.  'Most  everything  I've 
got  was  hers,  and  I  know  that  too.  I 
ought  to  know  it;  I've  been  twitted 
about  it  times  enough.  If  you  think  I 
ain't  careful  enough  with  her  things, 
you  can  take  them  back  again.  If 
presents  ain't  mine  after  they've  been 
give  me,  I  don't  want  'em." 

The  cousin  went  out  of  the  room 
with  a  flounce  of  her  purple  muslin 
skirts.  She  passed  into  Sarah's  little 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

room  where  her  cape  and  bonnet  lay 
carefully  placed  on  the  snowy  hill 
of  the  feather  bed.  She  put  them  on, 
snatched  up  her  green  silk  parasol,  and 
passed  through  the  sitting-room  to  the 
front  entry. 

"If  you  are  a  mind  to  go  off  mad, 
for  such  a  thing  as  that,  you  can,"  said 
Sarah,  rocking  violently. 

"  You  can  feel  just  the  way  you  want 
to,"  returned  the  cousin,  with  a  sniff, 
"but  you  can't  expect  anybody  with  a 
mite  of  common-sense  to  fall  in  with 
such  crazy  ideas."  She  was  out  of  the 
room  and  the  house  then  with  a  switch, 
and  speeding  down  the  road  with  the 
green  parasol  bobbing  overhead. 

Sarah  gave  a  sigh;  she  stared  after 
her  cousin's  retreating  form,  then  at 
the  poplar- tree,  and  nodded  as  in  con 
firmation  of  some  resolution  within 


SIX    TREES 

her  own  mind.  Presently  she  got  up, 
looked  on  the  table,  then  on  the  bed 
and  bureau  in  the  bedroom.  The  cous 
in  had  taken  the  fan. 

Sarah  returned  to  her  chair,  and  sat 
fanning  herself  absent-mindedly.  She 
gazed  out  at  the  yard  and  the  poplar- 
tree.  She  had  not  resumed  her  wonted 
expression;  the  shadow  of  the  stately, 
concentrated  tree  seemed  still  over  her. 
She  held  her  faded  blond  head  stiff  and 
high,  her  pale -blue  eyes  were  steady, 
her  chin  firm  above  the  lace  ruffle  at 
her  throat.  But  there  was  sorrow  in 
her  heart.  She  was  a  creature  of  as 
strong  race- ties  as  the  tree.  All  her  kin 
were  dear  to  her,  and  the  cousin  had 
been  the  dearest  after  the  death  of  her 

sister.     She  felt  as  if  part  of  herself  had 

' 

/been  cut  away,  leaving  a  bitter  ache  of 
vacancy,  and  yet  a  proud  self-sufficiency 


THE    COUSIN    CAUGHT    HER    BREATH    WITH    AN    AUDIBLE 
GASP" 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

was  over  her.  She  could  exist  and  hold 
her  head  high  in  the  world  without 
her  kindred,  as  well  as  the  poplar. 
When  it  was  tea-time  she  did  not  stir. 
She  forgot.  She  did  not  rouse  herself 
until  the  meeting-bell  began  to  ring. 
Then  she  rose  hurriedly,  put  on  her  bon 
net  and  cape,  and  hastened  down  the 
road.  When  she  came  in  sight  of  the 
church,  with  its  open  vestry  windows, 
whence  floated  already  singing  voices, 
for  she  was  somewhat  late,  she  saw 
the  cousin  coming  from  the  opposite 
direction.  The  two  met  at  the  vestry 
door,  but  neither  spoke.  They  entered 
side  by  side;  Sarah  seated  herself,  and 
the  cousin  passed  to  the  seat  in  front  of 
her.  The  congregation,  who  were  sing 
ing  "Sweet  Hour  of  Prayer,"  stared. 
There  was  quite  a  general  turning  of 
heads.  Everybody  seemed  to  notice 


SIX    TREES 

that  Sarah  Dunn  and  her  cousin  Sarah 
Dunn  were  sitting  in  separate  settees. 
Sarah  opened  her  hymn-book  and  held 
it  before  her  face.  The  cousin  sang  in 
a  shrill  tremolo.  Sarah  hesitated  a  mo 
ment,  then  she  struck  in  and  sang  louder. 
Her  voice  was  truer  and  better.  Both 
had  sung  in  the  choir  when  young. 

The  singing  ceased.  The  minister, 
who  was  old,  offered  prayer,  and  then 
requested  a  brother  to  make  remarks, 
then  another  to  offer  prayer.  Prayer 
and  remarks  alike  were  made  in  a  low, 
inarticulate  drone.  Above  it  sounded 
the  rustle  of  the  trees  outside  in  a  rising 
wind,  and  the  shrill  reiteration  of  the 
locusts  invisible  in  their  tumult  of  sound. 
Sarah  Dunn,  sitting  fanning,  listening, 
yet  scarcely  comprehending  the  human 
speech  any  more  than  she  comprehended 
the  voices  of  the  summer  night  outside, 
156 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

kept  her  eyes  fastened  on  the  straining 
surface  of  gray  hair  surmounted  by  the 
tiny  black  triangle  of  her  cousin's  bon 
net.  Now  and  then  she  gazed  instead 
at  the  narrow  black  shoulders  beneath. 
There  was  something  rather  pitiful  as 
well  as  uncompromising  about  those 
narrow  shoulders,  suggesting  as  they  did 
the  narrowness  of  the  life-path  through 
which  they  moved,  and  also  the  stiff- 
neckedness  in  petty  ends,  if  any,  of 
their  owner ;  but  Sarah  did  not  compre 
hend  that.  They  were  for  her  simply 
her  cousin's  shoulders,  the  cousin  who  y 
had  taken  exception  to  her  small  as 
sertion  of  her  own  individuality,  and 
they  bore  for  her  an  expression  of  ar 
bitrary  criticism  as  marked  as  if  they 
had  been  the  cousin's  face.  She  felt  an 
animosity  distinctly  vindictive  towards 
the  shoulders;  she  had  an  impulse  to 


SIX    TREES 

push  and  crowd  in  her  own.  The  cous 
in  sat  fanning  herself  quite  violently. 
Presently  a  short  lock  of  hair  on  Sarah's 
forehead  became  disengaged  from  the 
rest,  and  blew  wildly  in  the  wind  from 
the  fan.  Sarah  put  it  back  with  an  im 
patient  motion,  but  it  flew  out  again. 
Then  Sarah  shut  up  her  own  fan,  and 
sat  in  stern  resignation,  holding  to  the 
recreant  lock  of  hair  to  keep  it  in  place, 
while  the  wind  from  the  cousin's  fan 
continued  to  smite  her  in  the  face. 
Sarah  did  not  fan  herself  until  the  cousin 
laid  down  her  fan  for  a  moment,  then 
she  resumed  hers  with  an  angry  sigh. 
When  the  cousin  opened  her  fan  again, 
Sarah  dropped  hers  in  her  lap,  and  sat 
with  one  hand  pressed  against  her  hair, 
with  an  expression  of  bitter  long-suf 
fering  drawing  down  the  corners  of  her 
mouth. 

158 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

After  the  service  was  over  Sarah  rose 
promptly  and  went  out,  almost  crowd 
ing  before  the  others  in  her  effort  to 
gain  the  door  before  her  cousin.  The 
cousin  did  the  same ;  thus  each  defeat 
ed  her  own  ends,  and  the  two  passed 
through  the  door  shoulder  to  shoulder. 
Once  out  in  the  night  air,  they  sepa 
rated  speedily,  and  each  went  her  way 
to  her  solitary  home. 

Sarah,  when  she  reached  her  house, 
stopped  beside  the  poplar -tree  and 
stood  gazing  up  at  its  shaft  of  solitary 
vernal  majesty.  Its  outlines  were  soft 
ened  in  the  dim  light.  Sarah  thought" 
of  the  "pillar  of  cloud"  in  the  Old  ' 
Testament.  As  she  gazed  the  feeling 
of  righteous  and  justified  indignation 
against  the  other  Sarah  Dunn  grew  and 
strengthened.  She  looked  at  the  Lom- 
bardy  poplar,  one  of  a  large  race  of  trees, 


SIX    TREES 

all  with  similar  characteristics  which 
determined  kinship,  yet  here  was  this 
tree  as  separate  and  marked  among  its 
kind  as  if  of  another  name  and  family. 
She  could  see  from  where  she  stood  the 
^JiW~  .  pale  tremulousness  of  a  silver  poplar  in 
the  corner  of  the  next  yard.  "Them 
trees  is  both  poplars,"  she  reflected,  "but 
each  of  'em  is  its  own  tree."  Then  she 
reasoned  by  analogy.  ' '  There  ain't  any 
reason  why  if  Sarah  Dunn  and  I  are 
both  Dunns,  and  look  alike,  we  should 
be  just  alike."  She  shook  her  head 
fiercely.  "I  ain't  goin'  to  be  Sarah 
Dunn,  and  she  needn't  try  to  make  me," 
said  she,  quite  aloud.  Then  she  went 
into  the  house,  and  left  the  Lombardy 
poplar  alone  in  the  dark  summer  night. 
It  was  not  long  before  people  began  to 
talk  about  the  quarrel  between  the  two 
Sarah  Dunns.  Sarah  Dunn  proper  said 
160 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

nothing,  but  the  cousin  told  her  story 
right  and  left :  how  Sarah  had  talked  as 
if  she  didn't  have  common-sense,  put 
ting  an  old,  stiff  popple-tree  on  a  par 
with  the  folks  she'd  lost,  and  she,  the 
cousin,  had  told  her  she  didn't  have 
common-sense,  and  then  Sarah  had  or 
dered  her  out  of  her  house,  and  wouldn't 
speak  to  her  comin'  out  of  meetin'. 
People  began  to  look  askance  at  Sarah 
Dunn,  but  she  was  quite  unaware  of  it. 
She  had  formed  her  own  plan  of  action, 
and  was  engaged  in  carrying  it  out. 
The  day  succeeding  that  of  the  dispute 
with  the  cousin  was  the  hottest  of  a  hot 
trio,  memorable  long  after  in  that  vicin 
ity,  but  Sarah  dressed  herself  in  one  of 
her  cool  old  muslins,  took  her  parasol 
and  fan,  and  started  to  walk  to  Atkins, 
five  miles  distant,  where  all  the  stores 
were.  She  had  to  pass  the  cousin's 
161 


SIX    TREES 

house.  The  cousin,  peering  between  the 
slats  of  a  blind  in  the  sitting  -  room, 
watched  her  pass,  and  wondered  with 
angry  curiosity  where  she  could  be  go 
ing.  She  watched  all  the  forenoon  for 
her  to  return,  but  it  was  high  noon  be 
fore  Sarah  came  in  sight.  She  was  walk 
ing  at  a  good  pace,  her  face  was  com 
posed  and  unflushed.  She  held  her  head 
high,  and  walked  past,  her  starched 
white  petticoat  rattling  and  her  purple 
muslin  held  up  daintily  in  front,  but 
trailing  in  the  back  in  a  cloud  of  dust. 
Her  white-stockinged  ankles  and  black 
cloth  shoes  were  quite  visible  as  she  ad 
vanced,  stepping  swiftly  and  precisely. 
She  had  a  number  of  large  parcels  press 
ed  closely  to  her  sides  under  her  arms  and 
dangling  by  the  strings  from  her  hands. 
The  cousin  wondered  unhappily  what 
she  had  bought  in  Atkins.  Sarah,  pass- 
162 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

ing,  knew  that  she  wondered,  and  was 
filled  with  childish  triumph  and  delight. 
"I'd  like  to  know  what  she'd  say  if  she 
knew  what  I'd  got,"  she  said  to  herself. 

The  next  morning  the  neighbors  saw 
Annie  Doane,  who  went  out  dressmak 
ing  by  the  day,  enter  Sarah  Dunn's 
yard  with  her  bag  of  patterns.  It  was 
the  first  time  for  years  that  she  had  been 
seen  to  enter  there,  for  Sarah  and  Marah 
had  worn  their  clothes  with  delicate 
care,  and  they  had  seldom  needed  re 
plenishing,  since  the  fashions  had  been 
ignored  by  them. 

The  neighbors  wondered.  They  lay 
in  wait  for  Annie  Doane  on  her  way 
home  that  night,  but  she  was  very  close. 
They  discovered  nothing,  and  could  not 
even  guess  with  the  wildest  imagina 
tion  what  Sarah  Dunn  was  having  made. 
But  the  next  Sunday  a  shimmer  of  recr 
163 


SIX    TREES 

silk  and  a  toss  of  pink  flowers  were  seen 
at  the  Dunn  gate,  and  Sarah  Dunn, 
clad  in  a  gown  of  dark-red  silk  and  a 
bonnet  tufted  with  pink  roses,  holding 
aloft  a  red  parasol,  passed  down  the 
street  to  meeting.  No  Dunn  had  ever 
worn,  within  the  memory  of  man,  any 
colors  save  purple  and  black  and  faded 
green  or  drab,  never  any  but  purple  or 
white  or  black  flowers  in  her  bonnet. 
No  woman  of  half  her  years,  and  seldom 
a  young  girl,  was  ever  seen  in  the  vil 
lage  clad  in  red.  Even  the  old  minister 
hesitated  a  second  in  his  discourse,  and 
recovered  himself  with  a  hem  of  em 
barrassment  when  Sarah  entered  the 
meeting-house.  She  had  waited  until 
the  sermon  was  begun  before  she  sailed 
up  the  aisle.  There  were  many  of  her 
name  in  the  church.  The  pale,  small, 
delicate  faces  in  the  neutral  -  colored 
164 


'THE     LOMBARDY     POPLAR  -  TREE     STOOD     IN     ITS     GREEN 
MAJESTY    BEFORE    THE    HOUSE*' 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

bonnets  stared  at  her  as  if  a  bird  of  an 
other  feather  had  gotten  into  their  nest ; 
but  the  cousin,  who  sat  across  the  aisle 
from  Sarah,  caught  her  breath  with  an 
audible  gasp. 

After  the  service  Sarah  Dunn  walked 
with  her  down  the  aisle,  pressing  close 
to  her  side.  "  Good-mornin',"  said  she, 
affably.  The  cousin  in  Marah's  old 
black  silk,  which  was  matched  by  the 
one  which  Sarah  would  naturally  have 
worn  that  Sunday,  looked  at  her,  and 
said,  feebly,  "Good  -  mornin'."  There 
seemed  no  likeness  whatever  between 
the  two  women  as  they  went  down  the 
aisle.  Sarah  was  a  Dukh  apart.  She 
held  up  her  dress  as  she  had  seen  young 
girls,  drawing  it  tightly  over  her  back 
and  hips,  elevating  it  on  one  side. 

When  they  emerged  from  the  meet 
ing-house,  Sarah  spoke.  "  I  should  be 
165 


SIX    TREES 

happy  to  have  you  come  over  and  spend 
the  day  to-morrow,"  said  she,  "and 
have  a  chicken  dinner.  I'm  goin'  to 
have  the  Plymouth  Rock  crower  killed. 
I've  got  too  many  crowers.  He'll  weigh 
near  five  pounds,  and  I'm  goin'  to  roast 
him." 

"I'll  be  happy  to  come,"  replied  the 
cousin,  feebly.  She  was  vanquished. 

"And  I'm  goin'  to  give  you  my 
clothes  like  Marah's,"  said  Sarah, 
calmly.  "I'm  goin'  to  dress  different 

"Thank  you,"  said  the  cousin. 

"I'll  have  dinner  ready  about  twelve. 
I  want  it  early,  so  as  to  get  it  out  of  the 
way,"  said  Sarah. 

"I'll  be  there  in  time,"  said  the 
cousin. 

Then  they  went  their  ways.  Sarah, 
when  she  reached  home,  paused  at  the 
front  gate,  and  stood  gazing  up  at  the 
166 


ah, 


THE    LOMBARDY    POPLAR 

poplar.  Then  she  nodded  affirmatively 
and  entered  the  house,  and  the  door 
closed  after  her  in  her  red  silk  dress. 
And  the  Lombardy  poplar -tree  stood 
in  its  green  majesty  before  the  house, 
and  its  shadow  lengthened  athwart  the 
yard  to  the  very  walls. 


1 


THE    APPLE-TREE 


1AM  MADDOX'S  house 
was  like  a  glaring  blot  on 
the  tidy  New  England 
landscape,  for  the  very 
landscape  had  been  made 
to  bear  evidence  to  the  character  of  the 
dwellers  upon  the  soil.  There  was  no 
wealth  in  the  village,  there  was  even 
poverty,  but  everywhere  thrift  and 
making  the  most  of  little,  bringing  out 
of  humble  possessions  the  very  utmost 
that  was  in  them  for  beauty  and  utility. 
When  a  house  was  scarcely  larger  than 
a  child's  toy  it  was  white-painted  and 
green  -  blinded,  with  windows  shining 
171 


SIX    TREES 

like  jewels;  when  there  was  only  a  little 
patch  of  yard,  it  was  gay  with  flowers  or 
velvet-smooth  with  grass ;  before  it  was 
a  white  fence  or  a  trim  green  hedge, 
outside  was  a  row  of  carefully  tended 
trees.  But  Sam  Maddox's  house,  un- 
painted  since  it  was  built,  and  that  was 
nearly  a  hundred  years  since,  sagging 
as  to  its  roof  and  its  sills,  with  a  scant 
and  ragged  allowance  of  glass  in  the  win 
dows,  with  the  sordid  waste  of  poverty 
in  shameless  evidence  around  it  on  all 
sides,  stood  in  a  glaring  expanse  of  raw 
soil,  growing  only  a  few  clumps  of  bur 
docks,  and  marked  in  every  direction 
with  the  sprawling  tracks  of  omni 
present  hens.  In  the  first  hot  days  of 
May  this  yard  before  Sam  Maddox's 
house  was  a  horror,  actually  provoca 
tive  of  physical  discomfort  to  a  sensi 
tive  observer.  The  sun  lay  on  the 
172 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

front  of  the  Maddox  house  and  its  yard 
all  day;  every  detail  of  squalor,  so  ex 
treme  that  it  reached  the  limit  of  de 
cency,  was  evident.  Passers-by  turned 
aside ;  even  the  sweet  spring  air  was  con 
taminated  to  their  fancy ;  for  it  was  not 
in  reality ;  it  was  only  that  the  insult  to 
one  sense  seemed  to  imply  an  insult 
to  another.  In  reality  the  air  was 
honey-sweet;  for  there  was  no  crying 
evil  of  uncleanliness  about  the  place, 
and  in  the  midst  of  the  yard  was  a  whole 
bouquet  of  spring.  That  was  the  one 
redemption  of  it  all.  Often  one,  after 
looking  away,  unless  he  was  carping  to 
stiff  -  neckedness,  would  glance  back 
ward,  and  the  sight  of  the  apple-tree 
would  serve  as  a  solace  to  his  very  soul, 
and  beauty  and  the  hope  of  the  resur 
rection  would  vanquish  squalor  and  the 
despair  of  humanity.  There  was  never 


SIX   TREES 

a  more  beautiful  apple-tree;  majestic 
with  age,  it  yet  had  all  the  freshness  of 
youth  and  its  perfection.  Not  one  dead 
branch  was  there  on  the  tree,  not  one 
missing  from  its  fair  symmetry.  The 
blooming  spread  of  it  was  even  to  the 
four  winds ;  it  described  a  perfect  circle 
of  wonderful  bloom.  The  blossoms  of 
this  apple-tree  were  unusually  rosy — 
they  were  as  deep  as  roses,  but  with 
shadows  of  pearl  —  and  the  fragrance 
of  them  was  exhaustless.  The  whole 
tree  seemed  to  pant,  and  sing,  and 
shout  with  perfume;  it  seemed  to  call 
even  more  loudly  than  the  robins  that 
lived  in  its  boughs.  The  tree  was 
utter  perfection,  and  a  triumph  over 
all  around  it. 

On  the  day  in  the  month  of  May  when 
the  tree  was  at  its  best,  Sam  Maddox 
sat  in  the  doorway,  and  his  wife  Ade- 


THE   APPLE-TREE 

line  rocked  back  and  forward  past  the 
open  window.  A  baby  wailed  in  her 
lap;  she  held  a  cheap  novel  over  its 
head  and  read  peacefully,  undisturbed. 
Four  more  children  pervaded  the  yard, 
their  scanty  little  garments  earth- 
stained,  their  faces  and  hands  and 
legs  and  feet  earth-stained.  They  had 
become  in  a  certain  sense  a  part  of  the 
soil;  as  much  as  the  weeds  and  flowers 
of  the  spring.  Their  bare  toes  clung  to 
the  warm,  kindly  earth  with  caressing 
instinct;  they  grubbed  in  it  tenderly 
with  little,  clinging  hands;  they  fairly 
burrowed  in  it,  in  soft,  sunny  nests, 
like  the  hens.  They  made  small,  inar 
ticulate  noises,  indicative  of  extreme 
comfort  and  satisfaction,  like  young 
which  are  nursed  and  coddled  to  their 
fill.  There  was  very  little  strife  and 
dissension  among  the  Maddox  children 


SIX    TREES 

in  spite  of  their  ill  -  repute  and  general 
poverty  and  wretchedness.  The  Mad- 
doxes  were  pariahs,  suspected  of  all 
sorts  of  minor  iniquities,  but  in  reality 
they  were  a  gentle,  docile  tribe,  whose 
gentleness  and  docility  were  the  causes 
of  most  of  their  failures  of  life.  Sam 
Maddox  and  his  brood,  lacking  that  of 
comfort  and  necessaries  which  they  saw 
their  neighbors  possess,  never  thought  of 
complaining  or  grasping  for  the  sweets 
on  the  boughs  behind  their  wall  of  fate. 
They  settled  back  unquestioningly  on 
the  soft  side  of  their  poverty,  and 
slept,  and  smiled,  and  were  not  un 
happy. 

Over  across  the  road  Mrs.  Sarah 
Blake  cleaned  house.  She  was  small 
and  weak -muscled  in  spite  of  her  life 
of  strenuous  toil,  which  had  bent  her 
narrow  back  and  knotted  her  tiny 
176 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

hands  without  strengthening  them.  She 
staggered  out  into  the  hot  May  sunlight 
with  a  great  feather-bed,  tugging  it 
with  a  grip  of  desperation  on  the  slack 
of  one  end.  She  dumped  it  into  the 
midst  of  the  green  expanse  of  her  front 
yard,  between  a  tossing  snowball  bush 
and  a  syringa  on  one  side  and  a  strip 
of  lilies-of -the- valley  on  the  other;  then 
she  beat  it  with  half -futile  fury,  assail 
ing  it  like  a  live  thing  with  a  cane  which 
her  husband  had  used  to  walk  abroad 
the  year  she  was  married,  half  a  century 
ago.  Sarah  Blake  was  an  old  woman, 
although  she  had  never  confessed  it, 
even  to  herself.  Her  two  children  were 
dead  long  ago,  after  they  were  women 
grown.  There  was  no  one  except  her 
self  and  husband,  and  Edison  Blake 
was  much  older  than  she,  stronger  of 
body,  though  with  less  vigor  of  mind. 
177 


SIX    TREES 

All  the  morning  she  had  been  striving 
in  vain  to  whip  up  old  Edison  to  the 
point  of  enthusiasm  in  house-cleaning. 
He  was  lukewarm,  not  openly  rebel 
lious,  timid,  but  covertly  dissenting. 
Whenever  her  back  was  turned,  and 
she  presumably  out  of  hearing,  old 
Edison,  who  had  been  considered  un- 
regenerate  in  his  youth,  would  say 
something  under  his  breath,  and  then 
glance  apprehensively  around,  and  then 
chuckle  with  defiance. 

Once  his  wife  heard  him.  She  had 
left  him  meekly,  to  all  appearances, 
cleaning  the  parlor  windows.  The  old 
man  was  laboriously  wiping  off  the 
panes  with  a  cloth  dipped  in  kerosene, 
the  fumes  of  which  were  in  his  nos 
trils  ;  he  abominated  kerosene.  He  was 
stout,  and  his  fat,  pink  face  was  beaded 
with  perspiration.  He  pulled  his  col- 
178 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

lar  off  with  a  jerk,  then  he  said  some 
thing  with  force.  That  time  his  wife 
heard  him.  She  had  not  gone  so  far 
as  he  thought.  She  had  come  in  for  a 
clean  little  broom  to  sweep  the  feather 
bed,  after  whipping  it  with  the  cane. 
"What  did  I  hear  you  say,  Edison 
Blake?"  she  demanded.  She  eyed  him 
like  an  accusing  conscience.  Old  Edi 
son  gave  her  one  sidelong  glance,  then 
he  turned  to  the  window;  he  cleaned 
vigorously;  he  cocked  his  head  on  one 
side,  busily,  to  see  if  a  streak  remained 
athwart  the  sunlight.  "You  needn't 
pretend  you  don't  hear,  and  it  wa'n't 
nothin',  Edison  Blake,"  said  his  wife 
Sarah.  "I  know  you  said  something 
you  didn't  want  me  to  hear,  and  now  I 
want  to  know  what  it  was." 

"What  you  want  to  hear  for,  if  it's 
somethin'  you  think  wa'n't  right?"  in- 
179 


SIX    TREES 

quired  old  Edison,  with  a  feeble  growl 
of  self-assertion. 

"  I  want  to  know,"  said  she,  ignoring 
the  point  of  his  remark. 

"I  didn't  say  much  of  anything,"  he 
hedged. 

"What  did  you  say,  Edison  Blake?" 

"  I  said  goll  durn  it,  then,  if  you  want 
to  know,"  burst  forth  old  Edison,  with 
the  fury  of  desperation. 

"Edison  Blake,  I  don't  see  what 
you  think  is  goin'  to  become  of 
you." 

Old  Edison  was  meek  and  always  in 
a  state  of  chronic  intimidation  by  his 
wife,  but  all  things  have  a  bay.  Old 
Edison  could  find  his.  He  did  now. 
He  faced  his  wife  Sarah.  "It  ain't 
likely,  whatever  is  goin'  to  become  of 
me,  I'm  goin'  where  there's  house- 
cleanin',  anyhow!"  said  he. 
189 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

"You'll  go  where  there's  somethin' 
worse  than  house-cleanin'." 

"It  '11  have  to  be  pooty  goll  durned 
bad  to  be  any  worse,"  said  old  Edison. 

He  looked  steadily  at  his  wife.  She 
yielded,  beaten  by  masculine  assertion. 
She  essayed  one  stony  look  of  reproof, 
but  her  pale  -  blue  eyes  fell  before  the 
old  man's,  full  of  shrewd  malice  and 
quizzical  triumph.  She  tossed  her  head 
and  went  out  with  her  limp  calico  skirt 
lashing  her  thin  ankles  in  a  gust  of 
spring  wind.  "When  you  get  that 
winder  finished  you  can  come  out  an' 
help  me  shake  the  braided  mat,"  she 
called  back.  She  knew  that  would 
depress  the  victor,  for  she  was  merci 
less  and  miraculously  untiring  when  it 
came  to  shaking  a  mat;  she  would  not 
release  the  sufferer  at  the  other  end 
until  not  an  atom  of  dust  clouded  the 
1*1 


SIX    TREES 

air.  This  time,  however,  fate,  although 
an  untoward  one,  interposed.  Old  Ed 
ison  stepped  in  a  chair  to  facilitate 
the  process  of  cleaning  the  upper  panes 
of  the  window,  and  the  chair,  dating 
back  to  the  period  of  his  wife's  mother, 
and  having  seen  better  days  as  to  its 
cane  seat,  and  the  old  man  being 
heavy,  succumbed,  and  old  Edison 
came  with  a  jolt  through  to  the  floor. 
The  thud  brought  in  his  wife  Sarah, 
pale  and  gasping.  When  she  saw  her 
husband  standing  there  in  the  wreck  of 
the  chair  she  stared  a  moment,  then 
she  spoke.  Old  Edison  was  holding  to 
his  head  in  a  dazed  fashion,  not  offering 
to  move.  "  Now  you've  gone  an'  done 
it,  Edison  Blake!"  said  she. 

"It  give  way  all  of  a  sudden  an'  let 
me  through,  Sarah,"  said  old  Edison, 
feebly. 

i$a 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

"Didn't  you  know  better  than  to 
stand  up  in  one  of  them  cane  -  seat 
chairs,  heavy  as  you  be?" 

"  I  didn't  know  but  it  would  bear  me, 
Sarah!" 

"Of  course  it  wouldn't  bear  you. 
One  of  them  nice  cane-seat  chairs  that 
mother  had  when  she  was  married! 
I'd  ruther  have  given  five  dollar  than 
had  it  happen." 

"I'm  dretful  sorry,  Sarah." 

"  I  think  you'd  better  be.  Why  don't 
you  git  out,  an'  not  stand  there  starin' 
and  hangin'  onto  your  head? " 

"  My  head  is  kind  of  dizzy,  I  guess, 
Sarah.  I  can't  seem  to  see  jest  straight. 
I  come  down  pooty  hefty,  I  guess." 

"You  didn't  come  down  on  your 
head,  did  you?  Looks  to  me  as  if  you'd 
landed  on  your  feet.  That  nice  chair ! ' ' 

"Yes,  I  s'pose  I  did  land  on  my  feet, 

183 


SIX    TREES 

Sarah,  but  it  ain't  them  that's  hurt, 
but  my  head  feels  pooty  bad,  I  guess." 

There  was,  directly,  no  doubt  that 
it  did.  Old  Edison  turned  a  ghastly, 
appealing  face  towards  his  wife,  who 
promptly  advanced,  scolding  the  while, 
and  strove  to  extricate  him  from  the 
broken  chair.  But  that  was  beyond 
her  strength,  and  old  Edison  was  un 
able  to  help  himself,  although  he  was 
not  unconscious.  He  continued  to  make 
feebly  deprecatory  remarks  as  he  failed 
to  respond  to  his  wife's  futile  efforts. 

Finally  Sarah  Blake  made  an  im 
patient  exclamation.  "Well,  I  ain't 
goin'  to  work  this  way  for  nothin'  any 
longer,"  said  she.  Then  she  was  gone, 
not  heeding  the  weak  inquiry  as  to 
what  she  was  going  to  do  which  her 
husband  sent  after  her. 

Straight  across  the  road  she  raced, 
184 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

with  skirts  and  apron  flying  to  the 
wind  like  sails,  making  pitiless  reve 
lations  of  ascetic  anatomy.  Straight 
up  to  Sam  Maddox  in  his  peaceful 
leisure  on  the  front  doorstep  she  went. 
"  Edison  has  fell  and  hurt  himself,  gone 
through  one  of  the  cane-seat  chairs  my 
mother  had  when  she  was  married," 
she  said,  in  an  accusing  tone,  "an'  he's 
stuck  there  in  it,  and  I  want  you  to 
come  right  over  and  git  him  out.  I 
can't  lift  him,  and  he  won't  help  him 
self  one  mite." 

Sam  Maddox  raised  his  shaggy,  blond 
head,  and  brought  his  pleasant  blue 
eyes  and  pleasanter  gaping  mouth  to 
bear  upon  her. 

"Hey?"  he  said,  inquiringly,  with  a 
long,  husky  drawl. 

Sarah  Blake  repeated  the  burden  of 
her  speech  with  furious  emphasis. 
185 


SIX    TREES 

"You  want  me  to  come  over  and 
help  git  him  out?"  said  Sam  Maddox. 
Adeline  Maddox  had  come  to  the  door, 
and  the  small  baby  in  her  arms  was 
uttering  wails  of  feeble  querulousness 
unheeded. 

"Yes,  I  do  want  somebody  to  come 
over  an'  git  him  out,"  said  Sarah  Blake. 
"I  can't  lift  him,  an'  he'll  stan'  there 
till  doomsday,  for  all  he'll  help  him 
self." 

"Is  he  hurt?"  inquired  Sam  Mad 
dox,  with  some  interest. 

"Says  his  head's  kind  of  dizzy;  he 
looks  kinder  pale.  I  s'pose  he  come 
down  pretty  hard.  He  went  right 
through  the  seat  of  that  chair,  an' 
the  cane-seat  wa'n't  broke  a  mite  be 
fore." 

"I'll  come  right  along,"  said  Sam 
Maddox,  and  straightway  rose  with 
186 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

loose  sprawls  of  ungainly  limbs.  He 
seemed  a  kindly  and  ineffectual  giant 
when  he  stood  up;  he  had  doubled 
up  an  enormous  length  of  limb  in  his 
sitting  posture. 

Sam  Maddox  followed,  with  long, 
languid  strides,  Sarah  Blake,  who 
hopped  on  before  him,  like  a  nervous 
bird,  across  the  street.  After  them 
streamed  the  Maddox  children,  a  white- 
headed,  earth  -  stained  troop ;  in  the 
rear  of  all  came  Adeline  Maddox,  her 
paper  novel  fluttering,  the  small  baby 
wailing,  her  yellow  hair  flying  in 
strings. 

"  There  ain't  no  need  of  the  whole 
family,"  Sarah  Blake  called  out  sharply 
once,  but  they  came  on  smilingly. 

Poor  old  Edison  Blake  was  sitting  on 
the  ragged  edge  of  the  broken  chair 
when  they  arrived.  "I  swun!"  said 
187 


SIX    TREES 

Sam  Maddox,  when  he  caught  sight  of 
him. 

He  lifted  him  out  bodily  and  laid  him 
on  the  lounge,  and  Sarah  got  the  cam 
phor-bottle. 

She  was  not  in  the  least  alarmed. 
"He  come  down  pretty  hard,  and  his 
head  wa'n't  never  very  strong,"  she 
said.  She  bathed  his  forehead  with  the 
camphor  with  hard  strokes,  she  got  it 
in  his  eyes,  and  she  pushed  back  his 
hair  remorselessly.  "  Keep  still.  I'm 
goin'  to  see  to  it  that  you  git  enough 
camphor  to  do  some  good,"  said  she, 
firmly,  when  old  Edison  pushed  her 
hand  away  from  his  smarting  eyes. 

"You're  gitting  of  it  in  my  eyes, 
Sarah,"  he  remonstrated,  meekly.  All 
his  spirit  was  gone,  between  the  hurt  to 
the  chair  and  himself. 

"You  keep  still,"  said  she,  and  old 
1 88 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

Edison  screwed  his  eyes  tightly  to 
gether.  His  color  was  fast  returning. 
He  was  evidently  not  much  the  worse, 
but  he  groaned  when  his  wife  inquired 
how  he  felt  now. 

"Seems  to  me  he'd  better  keep  still 
awhile,"  said  Sam  Maddox,  looking  at 
him  compassionately.  "  Seems  to  me 
he  hadn't  better  clean  winders  till  he's 
rested  a  little  whilst." 

"  We've  got  somethin'  to  do  beside 
rest  over  here,"  replied  Sarah  Blake, 
with  unmistakable  emphasis.  Sam  Mad 
dox  smiled,  and  Adeline  smiled  foolish 
ly  and  sweetly.  They  appreciated  the 
sarcasm,  and  took  it  amiably. 

However,  old  Edison  groaned  again, 
and  Sarah  left  him  in  peace  on  the 
lounge,  when  the  Maddoxes  streamed 
homeward  across  the  street,  and  she 
returned  to  the  yard  to  resume  her 
189 


SIX    TREES 

struggle  with  the  feather-bed  and  the 
mats. 

She  was  somewhat  at  a  loss  when  it 
came  to  the  braided  mat  which  belonged 
in  the  sitting-room.  It  was  a  large  mat, 
and  very  heavy.  She  strove  to  lift  it; 
she  could  scarcely  do  that.  She  strove 
to  shake  it ;  as  well  try  to  shake  the  side 
of  the  house.  She  eyed  it  as  if  it  were 
some  refractory  animal.  The  negative 
opposition  of  inanimate  things  always 
filled  this  small,  intense  woman  with 
fury.  She  let  the  mat  slide  to  the 
ground;  she  gave  a  weary  and  angry 
sigh.  Then  she  looked  across  the 
street.  There  sat  Sam  Maddox  on  his 
doorstep,  lazily  regarding  her.  He  had 
certainly  seen  her  helpless  effort  to 
shake  the  braided  mat.  She  stood  ey 
ing  him  for  one  minute.  Then  across 
the  street  she  marched. 
190 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

She  stood  before  Sam  Maddox,  elec 
tric,  compelling,  this  small,  delicate 
old  woman  before  this  great,  lumbering 
giant  of  a  man. 

"  Sam  Maddox,  I'd  like  to  know  what 
you  mean?"  said  she. 

He  stared  at  her.     "Hey?"  he  said. 

"I'd  like  to  know  what  you  think 
of  yourself?" 

"Hey?" 

"I'd  like  to  know  what  you  think 
of  yourself?  You  heard  what  I  said 
the  first  time.  If  you  was  my  son,  I'd 
cure  you  of  sayin'  '  hey/  if  I  killed  you. 
If  you  hear,  why  don't  you  hear?  You 
are  too  lazy  to  sense  things  even,  un 
less  somebody  else  drives  'em  into 
your  head  to  save  you  the  trouble  of 
takin'  'em  in.  I'd  like  to  know  what 
you  think  of  yourself?" 

"  I  dun'no',"  said  Sam  Maddox. 
191 


SIX    TREES 

"  I  guess  you  don't  know.  If  you  did 
know,  you  wouldn't  keep  your  settin' 
long.  'Ain't  you  been  lookin'  over 
the  road  at  me  tryin'  to  shake  that 
great  mat  all  alone,  and  you  doin' 
nothin'?" 

Sam  Maddox  hitched.  His  wife,  Ade 
line,  with  the  baby,  came  slowly  to  the 
front;  the  earth-stained  children  gath 
ered  round. 

''What  did  you  s'pose  I  was  goin'  to 
do?"  queried  Sarah  Blake. 

Sam  Maddox  looked  at  her  with  the 
perplexed  stare  of  a  good-natured  dog 
trying  with  the  limitations  of  his  dog- 
hood  to  comprehend  a  problem  of  hu 
manity  ;  then  he  murmured  feebly  again 
that  he  didn't  know. 

"And  me  with  my  husband  laid  up 
with  falling  through  one  of  my  mother's 
nice  cane-seat  chairs  that  she  had  when 
192 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

she  was  married!"  said  Sarah  Blake, 
further. 

Adeline,  who  was  weakly  emotional, 
wiped  her  eyes.  Sam  Maddox,  feeling  it 
incumbent  upon  him  to  make  some  re 
sponse,  and  finding  speech  inadequate, 
grunted. 

"Well,  ain't  you  goin'  to  do  nothin' 
but  sit  there  and  stare?"  demanded  Sa 
rah  Blake,  with  a  sort  of  cold  fury. 

Sam  Maddox  rose  and  shuffled  before 
her,  as  if  essaying  a  dance. 

"For  the  land's  sake!  'ain't  you  got 
any  gumption,  no  snap  at  all?  Be  you 
goin'  to  sit  there  an'  see  me  try  in'  to 
shake  that  great,  heavy  mat,  an*  never 
offer  to  raise  a  finger?" 

"  Do  go  over  there  an'  help  her  shake 
her  mat,  Sam,"  sniffed  Adeline. 

A  look  of  joyous  relief  overspread  Sam 
Maddox' s  perplexed  face.  He  start- 


SIX    TREES 

ed  with  perfect  assent.  "Sartain,"  he 
drawled — ' '  sartain. ' ' 

"I'll  make  it  wuth  your  while,"  said 
Sarah  Blake. 

Sam  stopped  and  eyed  her  doubt 
fully. 

"What?"  said  he. 

"  I'll  see  to  it  you're  paid  for  it." 

Sam  settled  loosely  on  to  the  door 
step  again;  a  look  of  evanescent  firm 
ness  overspread  his  face. 

"Ain't  you  comin'?" 

"  I  ain't  workin',"  said  Sam  Maddox. 

"Mebbe  you  think  we  can't  pay 
enough.  I  guess  we  can  pay  as  much 
as  your  work  is  wuth,  Sam  Maddox. 
We  ain't  in  the  poor-house  yet." 

"I  ain't  workin'." 

"He  means  he  don't  do  no  work  for 
money.  Don't  you,  Sam?"  inquired 
Adeline,  tearfully.  The  baby  whim- 
194 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

pered,  and  she  dandled  it  with  no  en 
thusiasm. 

"He  won't  work  for  pay?"  inquired 
Sarah  Blake,  dazedly. 

"I  don't  shake  mats  for  old  women 
for  no  pay,"  said  Sam  Maddox,  with 
who  could  tell  what  species  of  inborn 
pride  or  generosity? 

"You  mean  you'd  rather  come  for 
nothin'?" 

Sam  nodded  obstinately. 

"You  think  we  ain't  able  to  pay 
you?"  asked  Sarah,  jealously. 

"Dun'no',  and  don't  care." 

"  You  mean  you  just  won't?" 

Sam  nodded. 

"Why  don't  you  come,  then,  an'  not 
keep  me  standin'  here  all  day?  I 
want  to  git  that  settin'-room  cleaned,  if 
I  can,  to-day." 

Sam  rose  again,  and  slouched  across 


SIX    TREES 

the  road  in  the  wake  of  the  little, 
vociferous,  indefatigable  woman.  He 
looked,  this  great,  loosely  built,  inef 
fectual,  blond  giant  of  a  man,  the  very 
antipode  to  the  woman  snapping  with 
her  overplus  of  energy,  as  she  led  the 
way  to  the  scene  of  labor.  He  might 
have  been  an  inhabitant  of  another 
planet. 

Now,  indeed,  came  a  time  of  trial  to 
Sam  Maddox.  From  where  he  toiled, 
in  the  Blake  yard,  he  could  see,  like  a 
vision  of  a  lost  paradise,  his  old  com 
fortable  door-step,  the  door-post  which 
leaned  luxuriously  to  his  back,  the 
warm  sunlight  which  overspread  the 
whole  place  like  a  sea  of  blessing.  The 
clamor  of  the  happy  children  playing 
about  with  an  incessant  enjoyment  of 
youth  and  life  was  as  pleasant  to  him 
as  the  hum  of  bees.  Adeline  rocked 
196 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

ever  back  and  forth  past  the  window 
with  an  inertia  of  peace,  and  the  great 
apple-tree  perfumed  and  irradiated  the 
whole.  Sam  Maddox  glanced  scorn 
fully  at  the  small,  reluctant  pear-tree  in 
the  Blake  yard. 

"What  be  you  a-lookin'  at?"  in 
quired  Sarah  Blake  from  the  other  end 
of  the  braided  mat.  "Shake  it  this 
way." 

"Your  pear-tree  don't  amount  to 
much,  does  it?"  said  Sam  Maddox. 

"No,  it  don't,  and  they're  winter 
pears  on  that  tree,  too.  They  last 
till  long  after  Thanksgivin' .  I  always 
make  sauce  of  'em  an'  have  'em  for 
supper  Thanksgivin'  night.  We  don't 
want  much  after  turkey  dinner,  an'  a 
little  of  that  pear-sauce  used  to  go  jest 
right.  I  dun' no'  what  ails  that  tree. 
He  trimmed  it  up  real  nice,  too." 
197 


SIX    TREES 

"Mebbe  he  trimmed  it  too  much." 

"No,  he  didn't.  I  ain't  goin'  to 
have  old,  dead  branches  or  spindlin' 
ones  that  don't  amount  to  much  on  a 
tree  in  my  yard.  I  believe  in  keeping 
trees  nice  an'  neat  as  well  as  houses." 

"  'Ain't  never  tetched  my  apple- 
tree,"  observed  Sam  Maddox,  with  un 
usual  pride. 

Sarah  sniffed.  "Well,  I  suppose  the 
Lord  looks  out  for  trees,  the  same  as  he 
does  for  folks,  when  they  'ain't  got  any 
body  else,"  said  she. 

"  It's  a  pretty  handsome  tree,"  said 
Sam  Maddox,  ignoring  the  sarcasm. 

"  I  don't  care  nothin'  about  the  looks 
of  a  tree  so  long  as  it  has  good  apples. 
I  want  apples  to  last  all  winter,  good, 
sound  ones.  I  want  'em  for  my  Thanks- 
givin'  pies.  I  feel  thankful  for  apples 
like  that,  but  I  can't  say  as  I  do,  if  I 
198 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

say  just  what  I  think,  for  them  early 
kinds." 

"The  apples  on  that  tree  would  keep 
if  we  let  'em,  I  reckon,"  said  Sam  Mad- 
dox,  "  but  we  don't  make  pies  nor  sauce 
of  'em,  and  we  eat  'em  right  up.  They 
ain't  quite  so  meller.  The  children  are 
dreadful  fond  of  them  apples." 

"I  didn't  s'pose  you  did  make  pies," 
said  Sarah,  and  she  sniffed. 

"  I  never  see  blooms  so  pink  as  them," 
said  the  man,  gazing  with  the  expression 
of  an  artist  at  the  tree. 

"I  don't  care  nothin'  about  blooms; 
it's  apples  I'm  arter,"  said  Sarah. 

That  was  a  red-letter  day  for  old 
Edison  Blake.  He  fell  asleep  on  the 
sitting-room  lounge,  and  when  he  awoke 
was  fully  aware  that  the  dizziness  in 
his  head  was  gone.  He  felt  guiltily  that 
he  ought  to  rise  and  resume  his  labor, 
199 


SIX    TREES 

but  he  could  not  resist  the  impulse  to 
remain  in  his  comfortable  place  a  little 
longer.  Sam  Maddox  passed  the  open 
window  with  a  braided  mat  over  his 
shoulder.  Old  Edison  heard  his  wife's 
sharp  voice  of  direction  and  admonition. 
"She's  got  Sam  Maddox  helpin'  her," 
he  reflected.  He  knew  how  small  an 
opinion  his  wife  had  of  Sam  Maddox, 
he  knew  that  he  ought  to  rise,  but  he 
lay  still.  Pretty  soon  Sam  entered  the 
room  for  a  brush.  Old  Edison  lay  with 
eyes  wide  open  regarding  him.  Sam 
paused  and  stooped  over  him. 

"  Better?"  he  inquired. 

Old  Edison  closed  his  eyes  in  affir 
mation. 

"Dizzy  feelin'  gone?" 

"'Bout." 

Sam  Maddox  looked  down  at  the 
aged,  recumbent  figure.  "Look  here," 

200 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

he  said.  He  bent  low  and  whispered 
sharply,  "Don't  you  git  up.  You  jest 
lay  low.  It's  durned  hard  work,  house- 
cleanin' ;  you're  too  old.  You  lay  low. 
I'll  stay  round  and  help." 

Old  Edison  looked  at  him  with  in- 
tensest  gratitude;  an  expression  of 
bliss  overspread  his  face.  He  smiled 
the  smile  of  a  contented  baby, 

"Just  go  to  sleep  ag'in,"  said  Sam 
Maddox. 

Old  Edison  closed  his  eyes. 

When  Sam  Maddox  emerged  from  the 
house,  Sarah  Blake  inquired  how  her 
husband  was. 

"  Looks  pretty  slim  to  me,"  said  Sam 
Maddox. 

"Asleep?" 

"His  eyes  was  shut;  looked  as  if  he 
was.  Seems  to  me  he  ought  to  keep 
pretty  still." 

2OI 


SIX    TREES 

"Guess  he  can  keep  still  enough," 
said  Sarah.  Pretty  soon  she  went  in 
to  peep  at  old  Edison.  He  lay  draw 
ing  long,  even,  whistling  breaths.  When 
she  went  out  of  the  room  he  gazed  after 
her  from  the  corner  of  one  cautious  eye. 

Sam  Maddox  worked  all  that  beau 
tiful  May  day  for  Sarah  Blake.  She 
was  the  hardest,  and,  in  fact,  the  only 
task-mistress  of  life  whom  he  had  ever 
known.  Sam  had  lived  somehow  with 
out  much  work.  He  owned  his  poor 
house  and  lot  and  apple-tree.  People 
who  pitied  the  children  of  the  irre 
sponsible  pair  assisted  them.  Once  in 
a  while  he  went  gunning  and  fishing. 
Somehow  they  lived  and  were  happy. 
When  Sam  Maddox  went  home  that 
night,  the  oldest  girl  had  dug  a  mess 
of  dandelions,  and  there  was  a  parcel 
of  cress  from  the  bank  of  the  brook. 

202 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

Somehow  there  were  a  loaf  of  bread, 
and  molasses,  and  tea.  Sam  had  no 
idea  how  they  were  procured,  but  there 
they  were.  They  all  ate  and  were  thank 
ful.  After  supper,  in  the  delicious  cool 
of  the  day,  Sam  sat  on  the  doorstep. 
Adeline  put  the  baby  to  bed,  then  she 
came  and  sat  by  her  husband's  side, 
her  elbows  on  her  knees,  her  delicate 
chin  in  her  hands,  and  her  sharp,  pret 
ty  face  upturned  towards  the  ineffable 
clear  pallor  of  the  sky.  The  children 
had  subsided,  and  were  grouped  in  a 
charming  little  cluster  like  a  bunch  of 
flowers  in  the  yard  under  the  apple- 
tree.  And  the  apple-tree  was  a  mys 
tery  of  whiteness  and  ravishing  fra 
grance.  In  the  day  it  had  been  sim 
ply  a  magnificent  apple-tree;  when  the 
shadows  came,  it  was  something  more. 
Sam  Maddox  gazed  at  it,  and  the  breath 
203 


SIX    TREES 

of  it  came  over  his  senses.  He  looked 
across  at  the  Blake  house  in  its  tidy 
yard.  There  was  a  light  in  the  sitting- 
room,  and  a  small  figure  bustled  back 
and  forth  incessantly  past  the  window. 
Now  and  then  a  larger,  taller  shape 
lumbered  before  the  light.  There  was 
a  sound  of  a  hammer  and  a  sharp 
voice. 

"  Old  Edison,  he's  had  one  day  off, 
anyhow,"  chuckled  Sam  Maddox.  He 
stretched  his  great  limbs,  which  ached 
with  the  unaccustomed  strain  of  the 
day's  toil.  He  continued  to  gaze  re 
flectively  at  the  Blake  house.  "  Dread 
ful  clean  over  there,"  he  murmured. 

"S'pose  so,"  assented  Adeline,  in 
differently.  There  was  an  angelic  ex 
pression  in  her  face,  upturned  towards 
the  sky.  ,.  Possibly  her  imagination, 
from  the  slight  stimulus  of  a  third-rate 
204 


i  DON'T  SEE  WHY  WE  'AIN'T  GOT  THANKSGIVIN'  ANY 
TIME'" 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

novel,  was  making  a  leap  out  of  her 
surroundings. 

"  Says  she  cleans  house  once  a  month 
from  now  till  Thanksgivin',  on  account 
of  the  dust,  an'  the  winders  havin'  to  be 
open  so  much,"  said  Sam  Maddox. 

"  Lord!"  said  Adeline,  indifferently. 

"I  shouldn't  think  they'd  have  any 
Thanksgivin'  when  they  got  to  it,  work- 
in'  so  hard,  an'  fussin'  all  the  time.  I 
shouldn't." 

Then  Adeline  looked  with  strong 
disapproval  across  at  the  Blake  house. 
"  Doggin'  round  all  day,"  said  she. 

"That's  so,"  assented  Sam.  "  It's  ter 
rible  hard  work  cleanin'  house. " 

"What's  the  use?  It  gits  dirty 
again,"  said  Adeline. 

"That's  so."     Sam  looked  again  at 
the  great  apple-tree.     "Mighty  hand 
some  tree,"  said  he. 
13  205 


SIX    TREES 

Adeline  looked  and  smiled.  Her  face 
was  really  beautiful.  "  Real  hand 
some,"  said  she. 

"  I  don't  see  no  use  in  waitin'  for 
Thanksgivin',  fussin'  and  cleanin'  an' 
cookin'.  I  don't  see  why  we  'ain't  got 
Thanksgivin'  any  time  right  along  any 
time  of  year,"  said  Sam,  thoughtfully. 

"That's  so,"  said  Adeline,  nodding 
happily. 

Sam  gazed  at  her.  "  Seems  as  if  you 
got  better-lookin'  than  ever,"  he  said. 
"  You  ain't  tired,  be  you? " 

"No;  'ain't  done  nothin'  all  day. 
You  tired,  Sam?" 

' '  Sorter.    Hard  work  cleanin'  house. ' ' 

11  You  can  rest  to-morrer." 

Sam  nodded,  still  with  tender  eyes  on 
his  wife's  face. 

The  wind  blew,  and  a  wonderful 
breath  of  fragrance  came  from  the 
206 


THE    APPLE-TREE 

apple-tree,  and  they  inhaled  it.  "  Lord, 
it's  a  dreadful  pretty  world,  ain't  it?" 
said  Sam  Maddox,  and  on  his  face  was 
a  light  of  unconscious  praise. 

"  Yes,  'tis,"  said  Adeline,  and  her  face 
looked  like  her  husband's. 

The  splendid  apple-tree  bloomed  and 
sweetened,  and  the  man  and  woman,  in 
a  certain  sense,  tasted  and  drank  it  un 
til  it  became  a  part  of  themselves,  and 
there  was  in  the  midst  of  the  poverty 
and  shiftlessness  of  the  Maddox  yard  a 
great  inflorescence  of  beauty  for  its  re 
demption. 


THE    END 


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JAN  22  199; 

("••    •  •-••.  ••  j 

JUN  17  1992 

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R  i,  1992 

p; 

FORM  NO.  DD6 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  BERKELE 
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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


